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Wasn’t the Cold War supposed to be over? - In a minor spat, Sens. Lugar and Obama are detained for three hours at a Russian airport
Chicago Tribune (IL) - Monday, August 29, 2005
Author: Jeff Zeleny, Tribune correspondent.
The trouble began shortly after the vodka toast.
Sens. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, had spent Sunday touring nuclear weapon destruction sites outside this Russian town. Before boarding their plane, they stopped at a reception at the airport to say farewell to their hosts.
“I would like to raise my glass to friendship between Russia and the United States,” Lugar said.
Victor Shmayev, who oversees nuclear warhead destruction at the Federal Space Agency, bid his American friends a safe flight, saying, “Let the number of takeoffs equal the number of landings.”
But for more than three hours, there were no takeoffs or landings. At least not for the plane sitting a few hundred yards away, the white and blue DC-9 with “United States of America” painted on its side in large letters.
The senators and a delegation of 12 Americans were detained in a peaceful yet diplomatically chaotic afternoon episode.
What began as a seeming bureaucratic misunderstanding escalated into an incident involving the White House, the State Department and several U.S. military officials in Washington and their Russian counterparts in Moscow.
When Obama and Lugar prepared to board their plane bound for Ukraine, local Russian border officials demanded to search the American aircraft. U.S. military pilots refused, saying the plane is protected from searches by international law and a joint agreement between the two countries.
“We don’t search Russian aircraft in the United States. You will not search U.S. aircraft in Russia ,” Ken Myers III, a senior aide to the Foreign Relations Committee, said to three border officials, who said they were acting on the authority of the FSB, the agency that replaced the KGB.
And with that, the standoff began.
The city of Perm, about 500 miles east of Moscow, is home to a small airstrip that accepts international flights, which are infrequent. American officials used cell phones to dial Washington, Moscow and points across Europe, trying to resolve the matter.
For a time, the Americans were locked behind a glass door inside a lounge at the Perm airport, which came equipped with the comforts of two easy chairs, one sofa and an aquarium. Lugar took a seat in a burgundy chair and did not become directly involved in the disagreement. Obama , meanwhile, found a spot on a floral sofa.
The senators used the detention period to catch a brief afternoon nap, and the doors eventually were unlocked. But local Russian officials kept the U.S. passports.
William Burns, the U.S. ambassador to Russia , made clear to Moscow officials that Lugar, a high-ranking Senate chairman, and Obama , a prominent newcomer, were being detained. The supreme allied commander for Europe, Gen. James Jones, also was apprised of the situation.
“It’s unfortunate,” Lugar said in an interview after boarding the plane bound for Ukraine. “It illustrates a dysfunctional state where the left and right hand don’t know what either is doing, and people are enforcing their whims of the day without deference to the world.”
One reason for the detention, according to the discussions, was that local border officials weren’t convinced the delegation was flying in an official military plane, which under a joint U.S.-Russian agreement does not require inspection.
“Do you have proof that this is a military plane?” a Russian border control official asked.
One of the pilots presented documents to the official, but he was not satisfied. All the while, two translators traveling with the delegation tried to make sense of the back-and-forth, calmly relaying the messages.
After heated discussions and repeated calls between officials in both countries, the situation was resolved, and Russian authorities returned the delegation’s U.S. passports. One Russian guard, distributing the documents, apologized.
(snip)
A foreign classroom for junior senator - Barack Obama tours the former Soviet Union, monitors the destruction of Cold War munitions—and takes notes from a senior statesman
Chicago Tribune (IL) - Friday, September 23, 2005
Author: Jeff Zeleny, Tribune correspondent
EXCERPT
They shared vodka toasts with foreign leaders and local dignitaries. ( Obama discreetly asked for water in his shot glass.) They were detained for more than three hours by Russian border guards. ( Obama paced a bit, but ultimately joined Lugar in taking a nap until the ordeal ended.) They met British Prime Minister Tony Blair at 10 Downing Street in London. (”They let me sit in Winston Churchill’s reading chair!” Obama declared.)
When you’re a freshman senator, particularly in the minority party, a mentor or tour guide is critical. Lugar, a frequent visitor to Russia and other former Soviet republics since becoming an advocate for nuclear disarmament 14 years ago, not only served that role but did something that might be unthinkable in America: He overshadowed Obama .
Seldom can Obama go anywhere in the United States, at least in political circles, without being stopped for a photograph or autograph. But on this foreign trip, he was barely recognized. While Lugar breezed through security at a top-secret Russian nuclear site, Obama was stopped for identification.
“I very much feel like the novice and pupil,” conceded Obama , 44, looking out the window as he flew over the Russian countryside from Moscow to Perm.
Words measured with precision
It had been more than five years since Obama had been outside the United States.
His blue tourist passport , which he had taken across Asia, Australia and Africa as well as most of Europe, was replaced by a burgundy one that designates him an official of the U.S. government. Motorcades have replaced motorbikes and bodyguards have replaced tour guides. (In Moscow, embassy officials were sufficiently concerned about Obama ‘s safety to place an extra bodyguard by his side.)
FWIW:
They had to check his Communist Party registration card.