Kremlin view

In Moscow. A two-day visit to Moscow to meet colleagues from there and Warsaw, plus Russian commentators, analysts and decision-makers.  I was posted in Moscow 1992-95; it's fascinating to see what has changed, including more shops, malls, restaurants, cars and office blocks.  Some things feel the same: the Moscow Metro is as magnificent as ever, the Kremlin bell-towers glisten in the sun, and the town centre still has the fading grandeur of an ex-imperial capital (after London, Vienna, Moscow and Berlin, Kyiv is probably the least imperial city I've worked in).  Our talks with contacts explore politics, energy issues, history and identity.   We also address the possibility of another gas crisis between Russia and Ukraine (see 20 June).  The many Russians we meet follow events in Ukraine closely both on a professional and a personal level – one energy industry expert tells me that his daughter is married to a Ukrainian and lives in Kyiv.  I'm often been struck that, 18 years after independence, Ukraine has not yet fully decided what kind of country it wants to be.  Our discussions in Moscow on how to appraise such key elements of Russia's relationship with Poland and Ukraine as the Katyn Massacre or  the Holodomor are a reminder that for Russia, too, the past nineteen years have involved adapting to a new reality.  But then which country is completely at peace with its past?  As with the recent decision to open the archives of the Ukrainian SBU, the successor to the KGB, the key to any discussion of history seems to be to have a frank and open discussion, based on the freest possible access to information.