If I Were President Putin

Chairing the G8 is a big deal. And a lot of flaks. Tony Blair found a way. This week, the World Bank announced the $37 billion debt relief for 19 poor countries....all traceable to Gleneagles.

The Russian Chairmanship should do something dramatic and fundamental, especially in its sphere of immense comparative advantage: Oil & Gas. We do not have enough details of its energy agenda yet - on which they had some meetings recently in Moscow. But we know that so much muck is being splashed around by its own customers from the Baltics to the Caucasus to Europe. Problem? Huge and rising energy costs, caused by high oil prices; and Moscow's legitimate desire to earn market rates for its exports.

The world economy is in a bind as far as oil prices are concerned. With China and India joining the American guzzling gang, and the kind of distorted weather wraths we now induce, the costs will only keep rising! OPEC has no extra capacities to exploit in the immediate term. And Russia, with its huge endowments, is not in OPEC....though they cooperate.

If I were President Vladimir Putin, I will use this G8 Meeting to change the world of energy for the New World. And make a few daring exploits with concessions. Here is how:

1. To secure the future of world trade, and the prosperity of Europe, Moscow should grant concessionary rates for its GAS deliveries to all its customers. They need the relief so that they can tackle the environmental problems, especially weather-related like the floods, and more so in Eastern Europe.

2. Russia should lead the G8 to thereafter get OPEC to fix a special rate for crude so that poorer countries can survive, and the debt-relief from Gleneagles may endure. They would soon relapse, otherwise, in the face of current spiralling oil costs.

3. To focalize the search for long-term solutions to this problem, and to preserve something for future generations, the G8 must join OPEC to establish the Global Task Force for Millennium Alternative Energy with a 10-year mandate, under the authority of the UN Security Council. It should learn from, and extend the gains of, the International Space Station.

4. Moscow should bring other oil-producers into a better alliance that will work with OPEC to grant special Tax Credits to airlines and the maritime operators, under WTO, from January 2007. This should guarantee travels and shipments - both necessary for global production and world unity.

5. Moscow, no matter the imputation, should create a unique portfolio for the energy needs of the former Soviet Union members. Their collective history, well highlighted by the Chernobyl memories in Ukraine this week, cannot and should not be wished away. Just do it! What's more: the kids, today and tomorrow, need it.

6. Learning from Chernobyl, the G8, under this chairmanship, should lead the way on the critical safety & security conditions for the re-emerging global rush/return to nuclear energy. It must be water-tight and cross-cutting.

7. If I were President Putin, I will clean up the anti-foreigners saga that is smearing the nation's image, by a tiny group of Russians. I will release those in jail for what has been rightly or wrongly termed political persecution, or personal vendetta. I will use my huge popularity to build a formidable successor-machine, having wisely rejected calls for regime/term elongation, and free up the media space.

8. If I were the Russian president and chair of G8, I will do the unthinkable: Get the presidents of Iraq, China and America to join me at home for a private get-together in May. Then, I will bring them plus the Iranian spiritual leader to an official meeting at the Kremlin in June. After that, we will hold a special security conference with India, Israel, Turkey and Pakistan in attendance! Agenda? Hey, give me a break! If you know not, by now, please return to Mars!!!

9. I will create and endow The Russia-Africa Council in a unique mould, to secure our own patch and ensure due balance in the ongoing inevitable rush for the continent's millennium resources. I will also do The Russia-South America Council for similar purposes.

10. It is now time to formally transform the G8 into G11 by binging China, India and Brazil into the club. Moscow should lead the negotiation, with a 2008 deadline.

11. As the Russian president with huge oil & gas "windfall" earnings, I will promptly pay off all foreign debts and boost the country's stakes in all international bodies, especially the World Bank and IMF as well as the European/Asian/African/Latin American Development Banks.

12. Finally, if I were Vladimir Putin, I will look forward to joining Bill Clinton on the international stage as an elder statesman, working for world peace, the prosperity of the Commonwealth of Independent States, and selling Russia at large. And I will do so courageously, creatively and compassionately,like Jimmy Carter & Mikhail Gorbachev rolled-in-one.