Latest Eurasia Daily Monitor Articles
GONGADZE’S KILLER REPORTEDLY FOUND IN ISRAEL
The investigation into the murder of crusading journalist Heorhiy Gongadze apparently suffered a severe setback last week. Secret information about the whereabouts of General Oleksiy Pukach, whom the Prosecutor-General's Office holds responsible for killing Gongadze in 2000, was leaked to the press. It has transpired... MORE
UKRAINIAN-TURKMEN GAS AGREEMENT BRINGS RADICAL CHANGE
On June 24 in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan President Saparmurat Niyazov and Naftohaz Ukrainy chairman Oleksiy Ivchenko signed a contract radically changing the modalities of the gas trade between the two countries. It involves a staggering volume of Turkmen gas, at deeply discounted prices, to be paid... MORE
TALIBAN ATTACKS GROW BOLDER
In the biggest operation since the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001, last week the U.S.-led coalition and Afghan forces backed by U.S. helicopters and British jet fighters killed more than 170 insurgents and arrested another 56 men, some of whom wounded. Afghan and... MORE
CIS COLLECTIVE SECURITY TREATY ORGANIZATION HOLDS SUMMIT
On June 22-23, Moscow hosted a meeting of the heads of state of the CIS Collective Security Treaty Organization (Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan) and concurrent meetings of the CSTO countries' ministers of foreign affairs, defense ministers, and secretaries of the national security councils.... MORE
RUSSIAN POLITICAL THINKERS JOIN THE DEBATE ON EUROPE
Irony and satisfaction – these are two emotions with which most Russian policymakers and analysts observe the acute identity crisis that the European Union currently finds itself in. Against the backdrop of the Commonwealth of Independent States' inglorious demise, the steady growth of the EU... MORE
POST-PUTIN RUSSIA: POLITICAL RUMBLINGS, POTENTIAL PRESIDENTS
Politics, like nature, abhors a vacuum. Confounding skeptics who saw him as weak and isolated, President Vladimir Putin has succeeded in eliminating all serious, organized political challenges to his "vertical power structure." But new political forces are now surfacing and jostling to fill the political... MORE
UKRAINIAN AUTHORITIES FILE CRIMINAL CHARGES OF SEPARATISM
On June 22-23 the Ukrainian Prosecutor-General's Office finally introduced the first criminal charges of separatism against two eastern Ukrainian leaders: Viktor Tykhonov, head of the Luhansk oblast council, and Yevhen Kushnariov, the former governor of Kharkiv oblast. Both men opposed Viktor Yushchenko in the 2004... MORE
MOSCOW REFUSES TO RATIFY BORDER TREATY WITH ESTONIA
On June 20, a special session of the Estonian parliament ratified the Russia-Estonia treaty that defines the border between the two countries. Ministers of Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov and Urmas Paet had signed the treaty on May 18 in Moscow after nearly a decade of... MORE
LARGE OPPOSITION RALLY SHATTERS NERVES OF AZERBAIJANI GOVERNMENT
Azerbaijani authorities have become seriously concerned about the success of the opposition rally held on Saturday, June 18, in Baku. More than 20,000 members of the election block "Azadliq" (Freedom), which unites the three largest opposition parties in the country -- Musavat, the Popular Front,... MORE
POPULAR SUPPORT INCREASES FOR DAGESTAN REBELS
May and early June brought intensified rebel attacks in Dagestan. On June 1, a bus carrying 20 policemen was bombed in Makhachkala, the capital (RIA-Novosti, June 1). Almost every night police patrols in the city are bombed, and the ambushes have recently spread to Khasavyurt.... MORE