Kudrin-Led Group Discusses New Political Party, Dmitriev Says

The Civic Initiative Committee, a group led by former Russian Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, is discussing a proposal to create a new political party, said a group member, Mikhail Dmitriev.

“We need to create a party that focuses on solving concrete, practical problems aimed at the modernization of the country and without an ideological agenda,” Dmitriev said in an interview today in Moscow. “It’s 100 percent clear that we need to create such a party.”

Dmitriev, who is also the head of the Center for Strategic Studies, a research group that advises the government, said it’s for Kudrin to decide whether he wants to lead the party. Kudrin left his post as finance minister last year after a public dispute with then-President Dmitry Medvedev over plans to increase military spending.

He has since discussed forming a political party with billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov, who ran against Vladimir Putin for president in March and considered forming his own movement.

“Prokhorov’s project looks like a failure now, and it’s time to think about a new party,” Dmitriev said. “Our committee alone isn’t enough. We need a joint effort from a wide circle of public forces.”

The group agreed to continue consultations over the proposal in the future, he said.

The committee, created last April to support civic initiatives, pledged to “oppose the actions of the authorities” and propose “alternative ways of solving political, economic and social problems,” according to its April 5 statement.

To contact the reporter on this story: Ilya Arkhipov in Moscow at iarkhipov@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Balazs Penz at bpenz@bloomberg.net