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A surprise decision by Presidents Dmitry Medvedev and Barack Obama to form a working group on civil society has raised controversy because of a decision to name as its co-chairs Kremlin deputy chief of staff Vladislav Surkov and Michael McFaul, special assistant to Obama and National Security Council director for Russia.

A day after the decision was announced during Obama’s recent visit to Moscow, a group of Russian human rights activists asked Medvedev to remove Surkov on the grounds that he was personally responsible for heavy state interference into the activities of civil society groups. Surkov is accused of authoring tough legislation on nongovernmental organizations in 2007 that made it much more difficult for Russian NGOs to register and operate. (For the record, he also authored the amendments that removed many of those restrictions this year.)

The activists’ fears are misplaced. The working group on civil society will serve a different purpose — it will operate largely as a confidential communications channel between Medvedev’s Kremlin and Obama’s White House to discuss matters of much greater importance than the procedures for NGO registration in Russia. Otherwise it would be hard to explain why the United States has agreed to discuss the development of civil society as a matter of state-to-state relations with Russia.

The need for a confidential communications channel between the U.S. and Russian leaders has been apparent since last August when Moscow and Washington experienced a spectacular failure to communicate over Russia’s war with Georgia.

The idea was intensely explored even before Obama’s inauguration in January. The challenge has been to find a bureaucratic setup that allows the United States to communicate directly to both Medvedev and Putin while avoiding the public appearance of Washington seeking to empower one at the expense of the other. Obama nearly stepped into this trap when he sought to talk Medvedev up and Putin down days before his arrival in Moscow.

Surkov is a perfect fit for this role because he speaks for both Medvedev and Putin, while his bureaucratic clout is unrivaled in Russia. He may not be well versed in foreign affairs, but his sense of gauging what is politically achievable is flawless and his ability to drive a hard bargain is unquestioned.

The working group will be a tough job for McFaul.

Vladimir Frolov is president of LEFF Group, a government-relations and PR company.