Cheney Has Harsh Words for Moscow

Vice President Dick Cheney, in the toughest critique of Russia yet delivered by the Bush administration, Thursday accused the government of Vladimir V. Putin of rolling back human rights and using the country’s oil and gas reserves as “tools of intimidation or blackmail.”

Cheney told Eastern European leaders in Lithuania that the Russian government had “unfairly and improperly restricted the rights of her people” and had taken other actions that might adversely affect relations with other countries.

The remarks, which drew swift denunciation from some Russian politicians, are likely to increase tensions in the run-up to a July summit of leading industrialized nations, to be held in St. Petersburg, Russia. Cheney’s criticism also could complicate the administration’s effort to win Russian cooperation in its effort to persuade Iran to halt its uranium enrichment program.

The administration has been increasingly critical of the Putin government’s steps to rein in political opponents and the Russian media and to consolidate its influence in the region. But Cheney’s comments carried added weight, coming from such a senior official and delivered in such proximity to Russia, analysts said.

“Russia has a choice to make,” Cheney said, according to a transcript of his remarks released by the White House. “None of us believes that Russia is fated to become an enemy.”

The vice president was speaking at the Vilnius Conference, a gathering of leaders in the Baltic and Black Sea regions, whose countries were once part of the Soviet sphere.

“This was very tough,” said James M. Goldgeier, a National Security Council official in the Clinton administration who is now at George Washington University. “There was no attempt to soften the language.”

The remarks appeared to signal that Bush intended to use the July meeting of the Group of 8 to press Putin on what the White House calls a growing “democracy deficit.” But it also may represent an effort by Cheney, who has pressed in private administration debates for a tougher line on Russia, to influence the policy, U.S. analysts said.

Russian politicians and analysts saw the remarks as a negotiating tactic aimed at weakening Russia diplomatically before the summit. They also described the speech as aimed both at the administration’s conservative political base in the United States and the pro-Western audience gathered at Vilnius, which generally is skeptical of Russia’s intentions.

Cheney emphasized that the U.S. was unhappy with Russia’s use of its oil and gas supplies as leverage against neighbors.

Russia’s state-owned gas monopoly cut off natural gas supplies to Ukraine this year in a price dispute that also interrupted sales to customers in Western Europe.

“No legitimate interest is served when oil and gas become tools of intimidation or blackmail, either by supply manipulation or attempts to monopolize transportation,” the vice president said.

He also criticized Russia’s support for separatist enclaves in Georgia and Moldova and its public opposition to Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko during the 2004 election protests that led to the rise of a reformist government.

“No one can justify actions that undermine the territorial integrity of a neighbor or interfere with democratic movements,” Cheney said.

He condemned Belarus, a close Russian ally, as “the last dictatorship in Europe.”

“There is no place in a Europe whole and free for a regime of this kind,” Cheney said.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko was installed last month for a third term after an election that was widely denounced as fraudulent. Lukashenko’s leading opponent, Alexander Milinkevich, was sentenced to 15 days in prison last week on charges of leading an unauthorized rally. Cheney said he had intended to meet with Milinkevich.

Cheney does not travel abroad frequently, but when he does, he often is charged with carrying important messages for the administration. Sometimes he plays a traditional vice presidential role by speaking more bluntly than the president he serves.

White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan sought to play down the comments, saying other administration officials had voiced similar criticisms.

Some U.S. analysts said Cheney’s remarks may in part be an attempt to preempt domestic criticism of Bush for taking part in the Russia-hosted summit. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) has urged Bush to stay away from the meeting because of what he considers the authoritarian drift of Putin’s government.

“This summit has begun to look like a political loser for Bush,” said Goldgeier. He said Cheney’s remarks could help the president at home. “They seem to be trying to lay out that it’s not going to be all coddling of Putin, and that they’ll have some tough things to say.”

But President Putin may not be receptive to the criticism. Russian officials have been increasingly unhappy about what they see as unfair international criticism. Putin has been preparing a speech on the state of Russia to deliver next week, said Stephen Sestanovich of the Council on Foreign Relations, who was the senior official for Russia policy during the Clinton administration.

“I would expect Putin to do some talking back next week,” he said.

Cheney’s remarks cheered advocates of a tougher U.S. line.

“We finally said something pretty straightforward at a pretty high level,” said Danielle Pletka, a vice president at the American Enterprise Institute, a think tank with close ties to the administration. “What should surprise you is that we haven’t done it long before now.”

Mikhail Margelov, head of the Foreign Affairs Committee of Russia’s upper house of parliament, told Russia’s Interfax news agency that though Cheney had called on Russia to “transcend old grievances,” that advice was better directed at the former Soviet states of the Baltics and the Eastern European countries represented at the conference.

Vasily Likhachyov, another member of the upper house, described Cheney’s remarks as part of an anti-Russia campaign.

“All this rhetoric is a response by certain circles in the West, particularly in Europe, to Russia’s increasing influence in foreign politics and the strengthening of its competitiveness,” Likhachyov told Interfax. “Our country is a factor in world energy security, and apparently not everybody likes it.”

Former Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, who played a key role in ending the Cold War, also criticized Cheney’s speech.

“I will say just a few words: Cheney’s speech looks like a provocation and interference in Russia’s internal affairs in terms of its content, form and place,” Gorbachev told Interfax.

Richter reported from Washington and Holley from Moscow.