Moscow has fun. And not just the celebrities who attended almost naked at a controversial party that ended with jail and fine for several participants. In the last days of 2023, the Russian capital has been filled, according to custom, with lights and giant Christmas trees. Muscovites have frequented shopping centers to receive the New Year as it deserves, with gifts and a full pantry for the next ten days of vacation. And this despite the recent mutual bombings and the fact that Russia has been bogged down for almost two years in a war that half of Russians would like to end by 2024.
Perhaps precisely for this reason, Russians try to keep life going its course. The conflict is expected to be long, with Russia superior from a military point of view and Ukraine that, although the help of the United States and the European Union does not fail, will have to defend itself on the battle front this year.
“We must take advantage of every opportunity to meet with friends. We cannot let what happens break that, because in the end that is what we are left with,” said Klara in a bar near Pushkin Square, in the center of Moscow, adorned with the typical lights of these days and full of activity and people making their last purchases of the year. A survey on the war by the independent Levada Center in September showed that apathy is the dominant sentiment. 52% said they do not follow the conflict carefully or do not follow it at all.
For those who do not have relatives on the war front, from the outside the New Year in Moscow seems the same as on previous occasions. On the night of December 31, however, there were no fireworks. Like other cities, the capital has renounced this spectacle in the last two years.
After the Ukrainian attack against the city of Belgorod on the 30th, other municipalities have joined in, but without giving up the celebrations. “It is a mistake to be influenced by terrorists and cancel New Year’s events and deprive our children of the party. “Fireworks are inappropriate, but the New Year’s program in the city center will take place,” announced the mayor of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Konstantin Brisgin.
Apart from the attack on Belgorod, the only thing that could have spoiled the celebrations is the increase in prices. Inflation, 7.5% according to official forecasts and which, according to Putin, could have reached 8% in 2023, has been a hard blow to the pockets of many Russians.
Even so, walking calmly through the illuminated and ornate shopping centers of Moscow was almost impossible during the last days of the year. The whole city has been celebrating and, as the reader reads these lines, they are enjoying the ten days of family vacation in January. In addition, Orthodox Christians, the majority religion in Russia, celebrate Christmas on January 7.
In the field of the economy, the Kremlin has turned to Asia. Russia has successfully evaded sanctions on its oil and has diverted flows from Europe to China and India, which together represent 90% of crude oil exports, Alexánder Nóvak, deputy prime minister in charge of the energy sector.
“The main partners in the current situation are China, whose share has grown to approximately 45%-50%, and, of course, India. Before there was no supply to this country. In two years, the total supplies to India represent 40%,” he specified. It sells to Europe 4%-5%, very far from the 40%-45% before the war.
Last week, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced progress towards the “joint production of modern weapons” with India. In the absence of final data for December, the Russian Government calculated 3.5% growth in its economy for 2023. “This confirms our ability to adapt effectively to any turbulence,” said the Minister of Economic Development. , Maxim Reshetnikov.
But the lights don’t dazzle everyone. The “special military operation”, as it is officially called, in 2022 increased the repression of the opposition and all criticism of military actions in Ukraine. That repression is still active. Putin’s number one enemy, Alexei Navalny, made the news in December while he was transferred to a prison in the Arctic and his associates reported him missing. A Navalny collaborator, former Tomsk councilor Ksenia Fadéyeva, was sentenced to nine years in prison for extremism. And two poets, Artiom Kamardin and Yegor Shtovba, will have to spend 5.5 and 7 years in prison, respectively, because in September 2022 they participated in a pacifist reading in Moscow next to the monument to the poet Vladimir Mayakovsky. According to OVD-Info, some 20,000 people have been detained in Russia for their opposition to the conflict. The NGO Memorial counts 633 political prisoners behind bars.
The war atmosphere has not even overlooked the celebrity party that scandalized the most conservative and pro-war sectors. A court fined the organizer, the influencer Anastasía Ivleeva, 100,000 rubles (one thousand euros), while the blogger Vacio (Nikolái Vasílyev) will be in prison for 15 days for minor scandal and LGBT propaganda because the only thing he was wearing was a sock on the penis.
Coinciding with the start of the campaign for the presidential elections in March, the Russian government and senior officials have launched optimistic messages about the war this year. Sergei Lavrov said that the Western strategy of “inflicting a strategic defeat on Russia” has failed. The Defense Minister, Sergei Shoigu, declared Kyiv’s counteroffensive deactivated.
With the main opponents and critical media eliminated, Putin aspires to a resounding victory in the elections of March 15, 16 and 17 and achieve his fifth term in the Kremlin. According to the Levada Center, in December he had 83% support.
After almost two years of conflict, Moscow still controls almost 18% of Ukrainian territory, including the Crimean peninsula, which Russia annexed in 2014. Ukraine is expected to go on the defensive this year. Its president, Volodymyr Zelensky, ordered on December 1 to strengthen the front’s defenses.
In the current war of attrition, numbers give an advantage to Russia, which benefits from a long struggle for its reserves of men (three times the population of Ukraine) and means, not to mention the tolerance of its population to suffer. Ukraine is counting on her courage and on defending her own country. “No one believes in victory more than I do,” Zelensky said. Something of little practical value if Western money is lacking. In 2023, Putin committed $157 billion to the fight against Ukraine, and by 2024 the Defense budget has increased by 70%. Ukraine is at the expense of the 61.4 billion promised by the US and the 77,600 million from the EU, currently up in the air because Congress is stopping it in Washington, and in Europe, Hungary.
Hope is growing in Moscow that Western aid to Ukraine will ease. In the West they believe that the Kremlin dreams of a victory for Donald Trump in the fall presidential elections in the United States. Moscow says that is not the case. “The American political elite, regardless of party affiliation, views Russia as an enemy and an existential threat. It would be naive to expect to improve relations with a victory for the Republican candidate. We don’t care who wins,” Lavrov told Ría Nóvosti on December 31.
But 2024 has begun as 2023 ended: with weapons raised and neither side willing to give in. The wish of half of Russians for the new year is for peace, according to a survey by the independent center Russian Field. Only 6% want Russia to achieve victory in Ukraine this year. Yes, Moscow has had fun during the New Year. But the way things are going, it may be the last party for a long time.