Top Russian law enforcer proposes int’l coalition to fight ‘US dictatorship’ and currency dominance
The head of Russia’s Investigative Committee, Aleksandr Bastrykin, has called for the creation of an international coalition of states to fight the “dictatorship” imposed by the US on the rest of the world, and to reject the use the US dollar as a reserve currency.
Speaking at a roundtable in Moscow, Bastrykin said that the world urgently needed a new system of checks and balances that would allow equal representation of all nations on the international political arena.
He said an alliance of countries was needed which could act in concert as “a feasible pole to counter the dictatorship imposed by the Americans together with their Western allies,” according to the minutes of the roundtable published on the Investigative Committee’s website.
READ MORE: Top investigator seeks primacy of Russian law
Bastrykin added that America’s current geopolitical dominance is based on its financial might, which in turn can be explained by “the uncontrolled and non-guaranteed” emission of dollars and the “all-enveloping” expansion of the currency. As that’s the case, Bastrykin believes the future coalition of nations should, as a primary measure, ensure the gradual removal of US dollars from their foreign currency reserves, followed by a total refusal to use the dollar as a reserve currency.
“It is against common logic to financially support the country that is using these same resources against our interests,” he noted.
The official told the audience that in his view the United States and its allies were waging a “hybrid war” against Russia which included price dumping on energy markets together with “currency wars” in the form of the uncontrolled expansion of the dollar.
The alternative proposed by Bastrykin includes the integration of the financial systems of various member-nations of the future coalition, including international centers for the accumulation of investment resources and systems allowing cross-border payments in national currencies.
He noted that several international organizations and groups – such as the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the Eurasian Economic Community, the BRICS groups and the Collective Security Treaty Organization – already contained the basic elements of the future alliance.
READ MORE: Russia should ‘exclude international norms’ from its laws top investigator urges
This is not the first time the head of the Investigative Committee has advocated greater independence and a more prominent international role for his country. In 2015 he proposed that Russia should legally enshrine the primacy of national law over international treaties. He also blamed Boris Yeltsin’s US advisers for including the principle of the superiority of international law over domestic legal procedures in Russian legislation. Bastrykin suggested the steps taken during Yeltsin’s time could be construed as legislative sabotage against Russia.
“In this difficult period Russian society is consolidated like never before and most importantly society now understands that the time for constitutional reform is ripe. This is why I believe that gradually, step by step, these ideas will be implemented into life in the interests of our sovereignty and prosperity,” the official stated in an extensive interview with the Rossiiskaya Gazeta daily.
