Latest Eurasia Daily Monitor Articles
TOP KYRGYZ OFFICIALS ACCUSED OF PLOTTING AGAINST OPPOSITION LEADER
A fresh scandal broke out in Kyrgyzstan when Omurbek Tekebayev, a member of the Kyrgyz parliament and a leader of the opposition movement For Reforms, was arrested at the Warsaw airport on September 6 for allegedly smuggling 500 grams of heroin. Polish authorities soon released... MORE
TASHKENT SEES ASTANA AS GATEWAY TO WESTERN COOPERATION
Uzbekistan’s turbulent bilateral relations with Kazakhstan, steadily improving in recent years as both countries vied for the potential benefits of cooperating with the West in the War on Terror, have now become a key political target for Uzbek President Islam Karimov. Karimov’s state visit to... MORE
PUTIN’S AMBITIONS AND RUSSIA’S MILITARY FEEBLENESS
There was nothing particularly disturbing about the failed launch of the experimental Bulava (SS-NX-30) strategic missile from the Dmitry Donskoi submarine on the evening of September 7. Failures happen, and they are quite useful for identifying problems that should be addressed before the missile is... MORE
RUSSIA, CHINA, JAPAN, AND SOUTH KOREA TO LAUNCH NEW SEA ROUTE LINKING CHINA AND JAPAN
The countries of Northeastern Asia have long mooted new infrastructure projects to improve transportation links in the region. However, some routes tend to materialize more slowly than others. Russia, China, Japan, and South Korea have now agreed to launch a new cargo and passenger sea... MORE
CHANGES PROPOSED TO BELARUSIAN LANGUAGE
The newspaper Belarusy i rynok recently ran a series of articles on education, devoted first to the new school year, but second to proposed changes to orthography and punctuation in the Belarusian language. These new rules are anticipated to move from draft to law in... MORE
RUSSIAN ENERGY MAJORS EYE DIRECT OUTLET TO MEDITERRANEAN
Russia’s ambitious attempts to cast itself as the principal energy supplier to world markets explain the new deal on an oil pipeline linking the Black Sea with the Aegean. During his September 4 visit to Greece, Russian President Vladimir Putin made a seemingly attractive offer... MORE
RUSSIA’S LATEST NAVAL TRAGEDY
On the morning of September 7, the St. Daniil Moskovsky, a Russian Victor III-class submarine that was commissioned in 1990 and went to sea in 1991, caught fire in the Barents Sea. The fire was caused by a short circuit in the electrical control panel.... MORE
NAZARBAYEV’S TRIP TO WASHINGTON: WHAT ASTANA CAN HOPE FOR?
Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s upcoming official visit to the United States will be his sixth summit meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush. As the trip approaches, more questions arise concerning the future shape of Kazakh-U.S. relations, specifically whether it should become a genuine, “strategic”... MORE
WILL YUSHCHENKO’S PARTY SPLIT?
President Viktor Yushchenko’s camp in parliament, as well as the party whose honorary chairman he is -- People’s Union-Our Ukraine (NSNU) -- may split. Not all of Yushchenko’s supporters have put up with the idea of co-habitation with, let alone participation in, the government of... MORE
REBELS AND SECURITY OFFICIALS FIGHT TO CONTROL TRANSCAUCASUS HIGHWAY
“Four servicemen were killed and four injured when a convoy of vehicles hit a mine,” the Russian state agency RIA-Novosti reported on September 6. Such news would not be a surprise coming out of Chechnya, but this incident happened in North Ossetia, a North Caucasus... MORE