This event is dedicated to the Russia/NIS Centre Corporate supports. By personal invitation only.

PROGRAM

9.00-9.30. Introduction

Thomas Gomart, Director of the French institute of international relations (Ifri) and Guillaume Schlumberger, Director for Defence Strategy, Counter Proliferation and Strategic Foresight, Directorate General for International Relations and Strategy, French Ministry of Armed Forces

09.30-11.00. Panel 1. Are the Foundations of the Putin System Solid?

Chair: Tatiana Kastueva-Jean, Head of Ifri’s Russia/NIS Center

• Russian Economy, more resilient that it seems?, Sergey Aleksashenko, Non-Resident Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution, Washington
• The Putin System and its Elite, Evgeny Minchenko, President and Chief Executive Officer of Minchenko Consulting, Moscow
• Potential of Social Protests, Françoise Daucé, Professor at the Center for Russian, Caucasian and East-European Studies at the School of Advanced Social Sciences Studies (EHESS), Paris

11.00-11.30 Coffee break

11.30-13.00. Panel 2. Russia and the Recent Developments in the Euro-Atlantic Space

Chair: Benoît Vitkine, Journalist at Le Monde – International Department

• What Tools of Influence? Julien Nocetti, Research Fellow, Russia/NIS Center, Ifri, Paris
• Moscow-Washington: An Impossible “Reset”? Thomas Graham, Senior Fellow, Jackson Institute for Global Affairs, Yale University, New Haven
• What will be Russia's strategy toward Europe? Timofei Bordachev, Director of the Center for Comprehensive European and International Studies, Higher School of Economics, Moscow

13.00-14.00 Lunch

14.00-15.30. Panel 3. Russia and the South Caucasus

Chair: Régis Genté, Correspondent covering Caucasus and Central Asia for Le Figaro

• A Strategic Regional Environment under Pressure (Syria, Iraq, Russia, Iran, Turkey), Thomas de Waal, Senior Fellow for Carnegie Europe, London
• Russian Hard and Soft Power in the South Caucasus, Sergey Markedonov, Associate Professor at Russian State University for the Humanities (RGGU), Moscow
• Georgia : A “Success Story”?, Nodar Kharchiladze, Co-Founder of the Georgian Strategic Analysis Center, Tbilisi

15.30-15.45 Coffee break

15.45-17.15. Panel 4. A Strategic Competition in Eastern Europe?

Chair: Céline Marangé, Research Fellow, IRSEM

• Four Years after Maidan: What progress has been made in Ukraine?, Oleksiy Semeniy, Director, Institute for Global Transformations, Kyiv
• China in Eastern Europe, Nadège Rolland, Senior Fellow, National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR), Washington
• Belarus, Russia’s Buffer State against NATO? Yauheni Preiherman, Head of the Minsk Dialogue Track-II Initiative, Minsk

17.15-17.30. Conclusions

Alexandre Escorcia, Deputy Director, Centre for Analysis, Planning and Strategy, French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs and Tatiana Kastueva-Jean, Head of Ifri’s Russia/NIS Center