"Orange spirit" creating sense of unrest in Russia

MOSCOW — Suddenly in Russia, everybody's talking about a revolution.

In a country with a popular president, a growing economy and a fragmented and weak opposition, Russia does not seem ripe for the kind of revolt that toppled governments in Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan over the past 17 months.

But as Lenin once said, "a revolution is a miracle," and the Kremlin and its political opponents seem bewitched by the possibility of one.

"There is an Orange spirit in Russia," said Andrei Sidelnikov, the young head of the new Russian youth group Pora! (It's Time!), which took its name from the young activists at the heart of the street protests late last year that ultimately brought Viktor Yushchenko to power in Ukraine.

"We are living through a new era of street politics. Our young people are becoming more and more active. ... They might explode when they can't take it any longer."

Sidelnikov's assessment, delivered at a Moscow news conference last week, would have seemed ludicrous a few months ago. But following the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, the government of President Vladimir Putin was unexpectedly shaken by thousands of retirees who took to the streets to protest cuts in their benefits. They were joined by the youth wings of opposition political parties.

The government quickly backed down and the challenge dissipated, but the fear or expectation of radical change has lingered.

"If we do not manage to consolidate the elites, Russia may disappear as one state," Dmitri Medvedev, the Kremlin chief of staff, said last week in a rare interview with the Russian magazine Ekspert. "The breakup of the Soviet Union will look like child's play compared to a government collapse in modern Russia."

This spring fever has largely centered on the potential of the country's young people, who until now have been noticeable only for their political apathy. Both the Kremlin and the opposition have been creating youth groups to either foment or forestall unrest.

In recent months, besides Pora!, groups with names such as Defense and Walking Without Putin have been formed to fight what they describe as an emerging dictatorship.

Pro-establishment forces have formed organizations called Nashi and Eurasian Youth Union, the latter promising to "stand as human shields in the face of the Orange bulldozer."

The deputy head of Putin's administration, Vladislav Surkov, met last month with some of the country's leading rock musicians, ostensibly to discuss the state of the industry.

But the meeting spurred speculation that the Kremlin wanted to cultivate the loyalty of the music industry, which played a critical role in sustaining the crowds on Independence Square in Kiev, the Ukrainian capital.

Surkov, one of the Kremlin's gray eminences and himself a one-time lyricist for the group Agata Kristi, discussed the state of Russian rock, from CD pirating to the dominance of happy-clappy pop on state television, according to reports.

The musicians agreed not to discuss the meeting with reporters, and the Kremlin has declined to comment.

"It was a very dull meeting," said Alexander Kushnir, a music writer and promoter who has worked with some of the invited musicians and communicated with them about it afterward. "At the start of the meeting, Surkov said he was not trying to put them under Putin's banner."

The same week, another government official met with a select group of movie, media and theater luminaries to discuss youth culture.

"The Kremlin became concerned, even a little hysterical, after the events in Ukraine," said Alexander Tarasov, co-director of the New Sociology and Practical Politics Center in Moscow, where he studies youth movements. "They were afraid they didn't have any plan in case such events happen in Russia."

Surkov is also believed to be behind the creation of the new youth organization Nashi, or Ours, which will have a founding congress in Moscow this month.

Members of the group, which emerged shortly after Walking Without Putin appeared this year, say they plan to create a new elite to govern Russia while preventing any attempt to overthrow the existing order.

"In my opinion, everything that happened in Ukraine shook Russia," said Ivan Mostovich, 25, Nashi's press secretary. "Young people began to discuss and think about Russia's direction. The main goals of our movement are modernization, democracy and patriotism."

But Tarasov and young activists such as Sidelnikov say they believe Nashi will contain a vanguard of hooligans who are prepared to engage in street clashes with other youth organizations.