焦点：開幕目前のソチ五輪、プーチン大統領には「危険な賭け」 | Reuters
開幕まで２週間を切ったソチ冬季五輪。ロシアを率いるプーチン大統領（６１）にとって最高の業績となるよう準備が進められてきたが、同国が抱える諸問題の象徴となるリスクもある。
五輪が華々しく開幕すれば、プーチン大統領は、黒海のさびれかけていたリゾート地を７年で現代的な五輪開催都市へと変貌させた自身の功績を誇らしく思うだろう。
夏冬合わせて五輪史上最高額の予算が投じられたソチ五輪でプーチン大統領は、自身がロシア最高指導者として正しいことを証明し、国民を団結させるとともに、旧ソ連時代から進化した国の姿を映すものになることを期待している。
「五輪参加者、ファン、ジャーナリスト、すべてのテレビ視聴者に新生ロシアを目の当たりにしてほしい。そして、この国を新たな目で、公平な見方で見てもらいたい」。プーチン大統領はソチで、内外メディアにこう力説した。
しかし、五輪の準備期間中、ロシアの抱える問題にもスポットライトが当てられ、マイナスの評判がプラスのイメージを打ち消すことも少なくなかった。施設の準備は整っているが、五輪が上手くいかなければ、プーチン大統領の夢は打ち砕かれ、自身の個人的・政治的な立場も危ぶまれる可能性がある。
プーチン大統領は、ソチ周辺の検問強化などで安全な五輪の開催を約束しているが、同国の治安部隊はこの１週間、ソチで自爆攻撃を計画しているとされる１人の女の行方を追っている。
また、英国の人気歌手エルトン・ジョン氏らから批判を浴びている同性愛宣伝禁止法については、ロシア人は同氏が好きだなどと述べ、批判を抑えようとしているが、その効果は出ていない。
さらに、五輪関連施設をめぐる汚職疑惑や環境への悪影響、移民労働者の不当な待遇に関する報道も、プーチン大統領には耳の痛い話だ。
推定５００億ドル（約５兆円）の五輪開催費用は、ロシアの景気が過去数カ月で悪化していることを考えると、なおさらギャンブルのように見える。
元閣僚のボリス・ネムツォフ氏は昨年、横領やリベートで約３００億ドルが消えたとする報告書をまとめ、「ソチ五輪はとんでもない詐欺にほかならない」と痛烈に批判した。
＜景気低迷＞
五輪開催地がソチに決まった２００７年当時のロシア経済は、原油高の後押しもあり過熱状態となっていた。２００３─０６年の４年間は国内総生産（ＧＤＰ）の伸び率が毎年６％以上を記録していた。
ただ、それは２００８─０９年の世界金融危機の前のことだ。プーチン大統領の３期目は、政治的・経済的な停滞で海外からの投資は失速している。今年のＧＤＰ伸び率は約２％にとどまるとみられ、同国の銀行も厳しい状況に置かれている。
環境活動家で野党指導者のYevgeniyaChirikova氏は、「我々が今目にしているロシアの銀行の破たんは、少なからず、国家の最高レベルで五輪を推し進めたことに起因すると考えている」と非難する。
一方、プーチン大統領自身は、こうした批判を「外野の騒音」だとして気にするそぶりを見せていない。２０１１─１２年の冬に起きた反政府デモで失われていた自信たっぷりな態度も完全に復活している。米経済誌フォーブスによる２０１３年版の「世界で最も影響力ある人物」ランキングでも１位に選ばれた。
プーチン大統領は記者団に対し、「どんなことにも反対する勢力が常におり、五輪計画でさえもそうであることを我々は良く知っている」と語った。
＜安全対策＞
今回のソチ五輪には、約９０カ国・地域から約６０００人の選手・コーチ・関係者が集まる。チケットの売れ行きは当初の期待通りではないものの、ロシア当局は自国のメダル獲得数よりも、会場を埋める観客数の方を気にしている。
最大の懸念は、五輪を狙った武装勢力による攻撃だ。ソチはイスラム教徒の多い北カフカス地域の西端に位置し、同地域では武装勢力がイスラム国家の樹立を目指している。
プーチン大統領は、約３万７０００人の治安要員を動員してソチの警戒に当たらせ、無人機や軍艦も配備。全国的にも厳戒態勢を敷いている。
しかし、ソチの安全対策が強化される中、北カフカス地域の玄関口であるボルゴグラードでは先月、連続自爆攻撃があり少なくとも３４人が死亡。すべての都市を守ることの難しさが浮き彫りになった。
また、「テロ脅迫状」が複数の国のオリンピック委員会に送られ、国際オリンピック委員会（ＩＯＣ）が後になって危険はないと断定したが、世界がソチ五輪の安全面に神経質になっていることが改めて示された。
元米中央情報局（ＣＩＡ）副長官のマイケル・モレル氏は「彼らは現地を完全にコントロールできていないことを基本的に認めたがらない」とし、ロシア政府のコミュニケーションのまずさを指摘する。
同性愛宣伝禁止法に対する抗議デモも、五輪に水を差す可能性がある。活動家らが呼び掛ける五輪のボイコットは実現に至らなかったものの、抗議活動はほぼ確実に行われ、警察の寛容さと忍耐力を試すことになる。治安部隊による弾圧が行われれば、デモそのものよりもプーチン大統領のイメージを傷付けることになる。
＜政権批判＞
プーチン大統領は批判を和らげるため、ソチでのデモ規制を緩和したほか、政敵の元石油王ミハイル・ホドルコフスキー氏や、反プーチンバンドのメンバーらを恩赦で釈放した。
それでも、反政府派はプーチン大統領の野党に対する態度に変化はないと口をそろえる。野党は、２０１２年に同大統領が再び大統領に就任して以来、政権による人権弾圧が続いていると訴えている。
反政府派は、ソチ五輪のプロジェクトは「政治上の見せ掛け」だとし、光り輝くビルを新築するかたわら、今にも崩壊しそうな住宅の存在を隠していると批判。五輪会場建設地や周辺では多くの住民が新たな居住先に引っ越しているが、一部では立ち退きへの不満も出ているという。
また、建設工事による土壌汚染を危惧する声や、移民労働者の労働条件の改善を訴える声もある。
プーチン大統領は、五輪が開幕すればポジティブな面にスポットライトが当たることを期待しており、個人的にも国家的にも五輪を成功させるための努力はいとわないだろう。
同大統領は「五輪、スポーツの発展、国家全体の発展には強い関係がある。それが実現することを期待する」と強調。国家の威信をかけたソチ五輪がいよいよ来月７日に開幕する。
High stakes for Putin at costly Sochi Games | Reuters
The Sochi Winter Olympics are meant to be Vladimir Putin's crowning achievement as Russian leader but are in danger of becoming a symbol of his country's problems.
When the Games open with great fanfare on February 7, the president will be there to revel in the unlikely feat of turning an ageing sub-tropical resort on the Black Sea into a glittering modern hub for a Winter Games in seven years.
He hopes the most expensive Games in Olympic history - summer or winter - will validate his role as Russia's supreme leader, unite the country behind him and show how far it has come since Soviet days.
"I would like the participants, fans, journalists and all those who watch the Games on television to see a new Russia, see its face and possibilities, take a fresh and unbiased look at the country," he told foreign and Russian media in Sochi.
But the preparations for the Games have also put the spotlight on Russia's problems, and the negative publicity has often drowned out the positive. Even though the facilities are now ready, his dream could still be shattered and immense damage done to his personal and political standing if they go badly.
For all his assurances that a "ring of steel" around Sochi will make the Games safe, security forces have spent the past week hunting for a woman who is suspected of planning a suicide bombing and may already be in the city.
His attempt to prove Russians are not homophobic by saying they like Elton John fell flat when the gay British singer responded by denouncing a "vicious" law Putin signed last year banning the spread of "homosexual propaganda" among minors.
Tales of corruption, outrage over his friends and allies winning lucrative Olympic building contracts, worries about damage to the environment and reports of migrant construction workers being mistreated must be ringing in Putin's ears.
The Games' projected $50-billion price tag looks even more of a gamble now that Russia's economy has taken a turn for the worse in the past few months.
"The Games are nothing but a monstrous scam," said Boris Nemtsov, a former government minister who issued a damning report last year saying about $30 billion had vanished through embezzlement and kickbacks.
STUTTERING ECONOMY
When Putin almost single-handedly won Russia the right to host the Games in 2007, the economy of the world's largest country's was in overdrive, powered by high oil prices, after registering annual growth of over 6 percent in each of the previous four years.
But that was before the 2008-09 global financial crisis, and the political and economic stagnation that has discouraged foreign investment in Russia during Putin's third term as president. Growth is expected to be only about 2 percent this year and Russian banks are starting to look badly exposed.
"I consider the bankruptcy of Russian banks that we are now seeing to be caused in no small part by attempts to promote the Olympics at the highest level," said Yevgeniya Chirikova, an opposition leader and environmental campaigner.
As Putin is so closely associated with the Games, and his legacy tied to their success, the stakes are high.
The 61-year-old former KGB spy, who has not said whether he will seek a new six-year term when his presidency ends in 2018, shows no sign of being worried by what he appears to consider background noise. His swagger, lost during big street protests against him in the winter of 2011-2012, is well and truly back.
Putin has neutralized the opposition threat, albeit by using methods denounced in the West as undemocratic, and boosted Russia's stature on the world stage, most notably by persuading Syria to give up chemical arms to avert U.S. missile strikes.
The Times newspaper in London named him "International Person of the Year" for 2013 and he topped Forbes magazine's list of the world's most powerful people.
Using a familiar tactic, he deflects criticism of the Games as Western attempts to discredit him and his country.
"We understand, and we know, and are used to it: There are always some forces that are against everything, even the Olympics project," Putin told reporters.
He sees the Sochi Games, which last until February 23, not only as a chance to give a resort loved by Joseph Stalin a makeover, but also to revive the kind of big infrastructure projects the late Soviet dictator favored.
Sochi has long resembled a huge construction site, but now boasts hotels providing 40,000 new rooms, state-of-the-art stadiums - and a new road and railway line to the ski resort of Krasnaya Polyana that cost about $8 billion.
Putin shrugs off criticism that firms owned or run by allies or friends, such as his former judo partners Arkady and Boris Rotenberg, won most of the big Olympic contracts.
Putin said allegations of corruption were "nothing but talk", underlining that half of the budget came from private funds and half from state coffers.
TIGHT SECURITY
About 6,000 athletes, coaches and officials from around 90 countries will take part in events ranging from Alpine skiing to ice hockey and snowboarding.
Russian officials are not setting a medals target after a poor performance at the last Winter Games in Vancouver. Moscow hopes for a bumper audience, although tickets have not been selling as well as had been hoped.
The biggest potential threat to the Games is a militant attack on Sochi, which lies on the western edge of the mainly Muslim North Caucasus, scene of an insurgency aiming to create an Islamist state.
The Games will be held on territory that was the homeland of ethnic Circassians until they were expelled in the 19th century. Islamist leaders say this amounts to performing "Satanic dances" on the graves of Muslims killed fighting Russian forces and one, Doku Umarov, has urged followers to prevent the Games going ahead.
Putin has put about 37,000 personnel on combat alert in Sochi and drones and warships are being deployed. Security is also high nationwide.
But twin suicide bombings killed at least 34 people last month in the southern city of Volgograd, a gateway to the North Caucasus, underlining the difficulty of protecting every single city and potential target across the world's largest country.
Letters making a "terrorist threat" have been received by several national Olympic committees, causing a brief alert that showed how jittery the world is over security, until the International Olympic Committee said they posed no danger.
Complaining of poor communication by Moscow on Games security, former CIA director Michael Morell said this month: "I think fundamentally they don't want to admit that they don't have complete control here and they might need some help."
Another potential party-spoiler could be demonstrations over the gay propaganda law.
Calls for a boycott of the Games have failed but protests are all but certain, and will test the tolerance and the patience of the police. A crackdown by the security forces could do more damage to Putin's image than any demonstrations.
ALL RIGHT ON THE NIGHT?
In an attempt to appease his critics, Putin has relaxed a ban on protests in Sochi, and allowed some of his biggest critics out of prison, including former oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky and members of the Pussy Riot protest group.
But critics see no real change in his attitude to the opposition, who complain of a clampdown on civil liberties since he returned to the Kremlin in May 2012 after four years as prime minister because of constitutional term limits.
Critics liken the Sochi Olympic project to a "Potemkin Village", with glittering new buildings hiding crumbling homes elsewhere in the city of 350,000 people.
Some residents are unhappy with being evicted from homes that were in the path of the bulldozers, even though most of the 1,500 families were resettled in modern accommodation.
Others complain of damage to the environment, notably soil pollution from building work, or about low wages and poor conditions for migrant workers.
"Unfortunately, a lot in Russia is done in a hopelessly misguided way, and this is no exception," said Alexander Valov, a prominent Sochi blogger.
Putin is hoping the spotlight finally turns on the positive once the Games begin, and will do all he can to ensure it is a personal and national triumph, even though he denies having personal ambitions with respect to the Games.
"As you know, there is a strong connection between the Olympic Games, progress in sport and the successful development of a nation overall," he said. "I hope it will happen."
