In Europe's Crisis, Russia Sees Opportunity

Russian President Dmitri Medvedev has scheduled several trips to Europe over the next month. This comes as Moscow has been watching the European financial crisis closely — in part out of concern that the situation could harm the Russian economy, but mostly because the Kremlin intends to use the crisis as a chance to gain political leverage in Europe. Moscow's plan is to make Russia look economically stable, buy European assets while they are cheap, invite European countries into Russia and possibly offer financial backing for the eurozone's bailout mechanism.