Yeltsin's Russia secretly calculated price for Karelia

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During the presidency of Boris Yeltsin, Russia calculated the price that it might ask for the return to Finland of the parts of Karelia that the Soviet Union took at the end of the last war.
      A price was also put on the Kuril Islands, which Russia took from Japan. The calculations were made in early 1992, writes Andrei Fyodorov in a column that came out on Tuesday in the publication Argumenty i Fakty.
      Economic experts felt that it might be possible to get up to 15 billion US dollars for Karelia, which was considered a very large amount of money. In today's money it would amount to EUR 13.5 billion, which is just under a third of Finland's national budget for next year.
      The price calculated for the Kurils was even higher - between 20 and 25 billion dollars.
     
The calculations were made at a time when Russia's political and economic crisis was at its worst. The Soviet Union had fallen apart the previous year, and left Russia in a deep state of internal conflict.
      Fyodorov himself served as deputy foreign minister in the waning years of communism, and for a short time as Prime Minister of the Soviet Union. From 1991 he worked as a foreign policy advisor to Vice President Aleksandr Rutskoi.
     
In his column, Fyodorov describes Russia's economic state and the extent of its internal problems as disastrous in the immediate wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union.
      "It was then that there was an internal debate within the government and among the inner circle of President B. Yeltsin. The talk proceeded on how it would be possible, in extreme circumstances, to use ‘territorial resources' to augment Russia's national budget. There was talk about Japan, Finland, and China", Fyodorov writes.
     
When weighing the possibilities, an unofficial list was drawn up in the inner circle of the government with arguments for and against selling parts of Russia. Arguments speaking in favour of a sell-off included the idea that the move could bring about a new period of technology and industrialisation in those areas.
      Experts also felt that the sale of areas taken over by Russia could serve as an indication to the world of "a new, democratic Russia".
     
However, none of these plans got beyond the paper stage. The leadership of a country that was on the verge of disintegration decided that selling parts of Russia to Western countries would be too dangerous an experiment.
      "We need to keep in mind that in those years, organisations along the lines of ProKarelia and Greater Finland had emerged, which openly said that possible Finnish membership in NATO would be a way to put pressure on Russia", Fyodorov says.
     
Fyodorov's column puts the recent Karelia debate in Finland in a new light. The debate emerged when the newspaper Kainuun Sanomat reported that Finnish political leaders had received messages from the Russian Presidency in late 1991, and again in January 1992.
      Former President Mauno Koivisto said in Helsingin Sanomat late last month that Russia did not offer to give Karelia back during his term as president. Finland also did not calculate a price tag for Karelia.

More on this subject:
 Fyodorov - key player in Yeltsin era

Previously in HS International Edition:
  Ex-President Koivisto denies Russia offered return of Karelia (24.8.2007)
  Report: Unofficial offers by Russia in 1991 to return ceded Karelia to Finland (16.8.2007)

Helsingin Sanomat