© Sergey Karpukhin/TASS

Top stories from the Russian press on Tuesday, September 5th, prepared by TASS

Putin-Erdogan talks fail to produce a revived Black Sea Grain Initiative; US mulls implications of Republican bid to launch impeachment inquiry into Biden corruption allegations; and the EU ends up overpaying for oil by shutting out Russian petroleum. These stories topped Tuesday’s newspaper headlines across Russia.

Media: Putin-Erdogan talks fail to reach agreement on reviving Black Sea Grain Initiative

Russia is ready to supply up to 1 mln tons of grain at a discount via Turkey to the poorest countries, with the assistance of Qatar, but this arrangement will not become an alternative to the now-defunct Black Sea Grain Initiative, Russian President Vladimir Putin said following talks in Sochi with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Currently, Moscow is preparing to deliver food products to the six neediest countries free of charge but, in general, it could return to the grain deal as soon as all provisions of the original Istanbul agreements of July 2022 are fulfilled, including those for unblocking Russian agricultural exports. Additionally, Russia is hoping for the swiftest conclusion of talks on creating a gas hub in Turkey. Work on construction of the Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant is also proceeding as scheduled and the first power unit is slated to be launched next year.

The role of a mediator is very beneficial for Turkey, Dmitry Belik, member of the Russian State Duma (lower house) Foreign Affairs Committee, said. "In any case, Erdogan will conduct a policy that corresponds to Turkey’s national interests. He is building his strategy in such a way so that Ankara would derive benefits not necessarily from the results of talks but from the process itself. The position of mediator enables one to remain equidistant from both parties to the conflict but at the same time to get closer to the winning side if necessary. Ankara is calculating the risks in order to avoid any scenario that would be uncomfortable for it and, in this case, the mediator’s role is the perfect option," he told Izvestia.

Reviving the grain deal at this point is problematic, Turkish political scientist Hakan Aksay said. In a conversation with Vedomosti, he noted that, so far, the West is not showing any readiness to meet Russia’s conditions, which entail reconnecting the Russian Agricultural Bank to SWIFT and restoring the Togliatti-Odessa ammonia pipeline. And Ankara, even if it wanted to, cannot speak on behalf of the West or put serious pressure on it to implement the Russia-related provisions.

That said, the major positive takeaway from the Putin-Erdogan tete-a-tete is the decision to ship 1 mln tons of Russian grain to Turkey for processing and further delivery to African countries in need, said Arif Asalyoglu, general director of the International Institute for the Development of Scientific Cooperation, who noted that this project is beneficial for both countries. In a conversation with Vedomosti, the Turkish expert explained that this project provides an image-enhancing opportunity for Moscow that allows it to bolster its position in Africa, while it also offers Turkey’s agribusiness sector an opportunity to put its additional capacities to work. He added that this initiative offers the added benefit of casting Erdogan in a good light on the eve of the G20 Summit in New Delhi on September 9-10.

Izvestia: US mulls implications of launching impeachment inquiry into Biden allegations

The US Republican Party, which now enjoys a slim majority in the House of Representatives (lower house), are planning to hold a vote on launching an investigation under the impeachment provisions of the Constitution into allegations of wrongdoing by US President Joe Biden. While it is unlikely that the president would resign or be removed from office, the situation may seriously affect the race for the Oval Office, which will heat up in earnest in 2024. The consensus among the expert community is that initiating an impeachment inquiry would not only serve to lower Biden’s popularity rating in the polls but would also diminish his chances for re-election. In this case, victory may go to Biden’s chief rival, former President Donald Trump, who to date has been indicted in four separate criminal investigations.

Despite the complexity of the procedure, the threat of impeachment by the House is quite real, experts polled by Izvestia said. This is particularly true given that, recently, details of corruption schemes allegedly involving Biden and his son Hunter have begun to appear more and more frequently in the news, Dmitry Suslov, deputy director of the Center for Comprehensive European and International Studies at the Higher School of Economics (HSE University) and a Valdai Club expert, said.

"First of all, it turns out that Joe Biden participated, indirectly or even directly, in these business schemes, including those pertaining to Ukraine and China. Secondly, [it appears] that Biden lied during his 2020 election campaign [by making claims] that he purportedly did not know anything about his son’s business affairs. Thirdly, [it appears] that the Biden administration is obstructing justice, i.e. the investigation against Hunter [Biden], while, at the same time, accelerating criminal charges against Donald Trump," he noted.

However, according to the expert, the impeachment bid will ultimately fail and Biden will not be forced to step down because there will not be the necessary two-thirds vote in the upper house Senate for impeachment to proceed to an actual trial and removal from office. However, the situation itself may become a certain card up the Republican Party’s sleeve, said Russian International Affairs Council Program Manager Konstantin Sukhoverkhov. According to him, even if an impeachment inquiry is launched, it would hardly have any substantial impact on the Democrats’ core electorate because the underlying issues are not particularly important for them. However, the incumbent president’s poll numbers may still sink further under the weight of the bad publicity. If the impeachment procedure is seen through until the end, the Democratic Party itself would have to distance itself from Biden.

That said, Suslov thinks that initiating the impeachment procedure may not only damage Biden’s popularity rating but also decrease his chances for re-election. "The thing is that the procedure lets Congress request much more documents and conduct investigations into the offenses that Biden is accused of. The administration will have fewer opportunities to deny Congress the relevant materials. As a result of this procedure, even more scandals will emerge and become public, which would inevitably impact support for Biden," the expert explained.

Vedomosti: EU overpays for oil by cutting share of imported Russian oil products ten-fold

The total share of Russian oil and petroleum products in the overall volume of imports going to EU countries by the end of 2Q 2023 fell to 2.3%, according to a Eurostat report, which does not cite raw numbers. According to the UN Comtrade, the volume of oil and petroleum products supplies from Russia to the EU amounted to 4.9 mln tons, or $2.1 bln in monetary terms, over 2Q of this year.

According to Kirill Rodionov, an expert at the Institute for the Development of Technologies in the Fuel and Energy Complex, after the first 6 months of 2023, the EU had reduced the import of crude oil by 1% year on year to 232 mln tons. Over this period, oil deliveries from Russia to the EU plummeted by 81% to 11 mln tons, according to his estimates, while Russia’s share in the import structure shrunk dramatically from 25% to 5%. That said, earnings from Russian oil exports to Europe in January-June 2023 dropped sharply by almost ten-fold versus the same period in 2022, to 3.9 bln euros, he specified.

The EU’s rejection of Russian oil has led to a reconfiguration of the global oil market while logistics expenses have grown, triggering growing oil prices in the global market, said Igor Yushkov, senior analyst at the National Energy Security Fund. Additionally, many European oil refineries reduced oil processing because it became cheaper for some EU countries to import ready-to-use petroleum products than produce them on site, as is happening in Germany.

Sergey Grishunin, managing director of rating service NRA, also pointed out the indirect negative effects for European oil refineries. According to his estimates, demand for petroleum products in Europe currently is approximately 2% higher than in 2022, so the EU has to buy fuel in third countries, including that produced from Russian oil. That said, according to his calculations, the import of petroleum products costs EU countries 5-10% more than processing Russian oil at their own refineries. Additionally, the margin of processers of $2-5 per barrel also gets lost, the expert noted.

Had it not been for sanctions against Moscow, Russian oil would have cost the EU $35/ton less than current purchases, while for petroleum products, the amount being overpaid is $120 per ton, Grishunin said.

Izvestia: US finds new ways to instigate standoff among ASEAN members over Ukraine stance

During the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit, which kicks off in Jakarta on September 5, the US will try to put pressure on countries in the region as regards the Ukraine conflict. However, the regional bloc is unlikely to take sides, experts polled by Izvestia said. Moreover, those conflicts that are geographically closer to the region, such as instability in Myanmar and disputes over the South China Sea, are more likely to take center stage.

Joanne Lin, lead researcher of the ISEAS Yusof Ishak Institute’s ASEAN Studies Center, told Izvestia that the situation in Myanmar will continue to remain grim given that ASEAN has little leverage over it. In her opinion, ASEAN leaders will continue to monitor this issue, urging each other to do more, but they realize that their actions are limited given that other major players, such as China, Russia and India, continue to support the military regime in Myanmar to a certain extent.

"The top goal for the US today is to discredit China and Russia’s policy as much as possible. Its main weapon is total propaganda and information warfare in order to create an atmosphere of distrust and sow wariness with regard to Beijing and Moscow. And toward this end, [the US] is using any available international forum. I think, it will become commonplace for the entire Western bloc to attend all possible international events," said Dmitry Mosyakov, head of the Center for the Study of Southeast Asia, Australia and Oceania at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute for Eastern Studies.

However, Lin thinks that the wording on the situation in Ukraine in the summit chairman’s statement will be very similar to, if not the same as, that used at the July meeting of ASEAN foreign ministers. According to her, it is hardly likely that Russia would be mentioned in any statements by ASEAN itself, although its dialogue partners, such as the US, Japan, and possibly South Korea or Australia, might come up with stronger language. The expert thinks that ASEAN’s stance on Ukraine would be restricted to mentioning respect for its sovereignty, political independence and territorial integrity. Its statement would demand observing international law, the UN Charter, stopping hostilities and ensuring unhindered access to humanitarian aid, the expert predicted.

Vedomosti: Ukrainian defense minister sacked as part of Kiev’s purported war on corruption

On September 4, Ukrainian Defense Minister Alexey Reznikov submitted a letter of resignation to the Verkhovna Rada (parliament). He has headed the ministry since November 2021. His potential replacement, Rustem Umerov, head of the State Property Fund of Ukraine, has also submitted his letter of resignation to parliament. Earlier, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said that Reznikov had to step down because the military agency needs "new approaches and different formats of interacting both with the military and society."

Reznikov’s resignation was triggered by Western pressure on the Ukrainian leadership, said political scientist Alexander Nemtsev. "In the near future, a meeting is possible between Zelensky and US President Joe Biden. So, it is important for the Ukrainian president to point to a culprit for the Ukrainian army’s failure on the battlefield in order to continue receiving aid from Washington," the expert thinks. That said, the political scientist thinks that Reznikov will remain on Zelensky’s team, soon taking a new office without having to face any charges of corruption.

Swapping Reznikov for Umerov has no overarching significance from the point of view of the further development of Ukraine’s military strategy, said Dmitry Ofitserov-Belsky, a senior researcher at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Primakov Institute of World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO RAS) and a Valdai Club expert. The expert noted that appointing a civilian to lead a defense agency is common practice in many countries. Had the goal been to change the course of military actions, then Zelensky would have replaced Ukrainian Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief Valery Zaluzhny, the expert asserted.

Ofitserov-Belsky suggested that one of the reasons for the reshuffle may have been the differences of opinion between Reznikov and Zelensky on the necessity of launching a counteroffensive. On the other hand, the sacking of Reznikov may adversely impact the level of interaction with Western countries on arms deliveries because, with his departure, his personal contacts among European and US officials will also be lost, the expert concluded.