
Latest Eurasia Daily Monitor Articles

Putin Approves Secret Russian Defense Plan for 2021–2025
On November 13, President Vladimir Putin signed a decree (ukaz) “On the Implementation of the Defense Plan of the Russian Federation for 2021–2025” (hereafter, the Plan), which will officially enter into force on January 1 (Pravo.gov.ru, November 13). The Plan—whose history dates back to 1996,... MORE

Turkmenistan, Now With Soviet-Style Deficits, on Brink of Explosion
Turkmenistan, far and away the most closed country in the former Soviet space, seldom receives much attention except as the butt of dismissive jokes or, more recently, when its leaders tried to deny that COVID-19 is present in their country even as they took measures... MORE

The Minsk Group: Karabakh War’s Diplomatic Casualty (Part Two)
*To read Part One, please click here. The second Karabakh war between Armenia and Azerbaijan (September–November 2020) has conclusively discredited the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s (OSCE) Minsk Group, the instrument of multilateral diplomacy mandated 28 years ago to mediate a solution to... MORE

Iran and the SCO: Continued Obstacles to Full Membership
The 20th summit of the Council of Heads of State of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) was held virtually, on November 10, under the rotating chairmanship of the Russian Federation. The leaders of the regional organization’s member states—Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, India and... MORE

COVID-19 and Russia’s Looming Debt Cliff
COVID-19’s “second wave” is pushing back economic recovery all over the globe, giving rise to predictions of massive recorded drops in GDP this year followed by a robust recovery in 2021 and decent growth rates after that. Official economic forecasts in Russia notably mirror those... MORE

Putin at Loss About Connecting With New US Leadership
One of the few world leaders yet to acknowledge the outcome of the presidential election in the United States is Russian President Vladimir Putin. This procrastination is strikingly uncharacteristic: Putin, for instance, congratulated Maia Sandu the next day after her victory over incumbent and patently... MORE

Russian Naval Base in Sudan: Extending Moscow’s Influence in Middle East and North Africa
Russia is determinedly expanding its influence in Africa. On November 16, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed an order for the country to build a naval base on Sudan’s Red Sea coast, its first in Africa since the end of the Cold War. According to Putin’s... MORE

No End in Sight for Belarusian Political Crisis
The turbulent stalemate in Minsk continues, despite the fact that street protests have been subsiding and their full-scale resumption is not expected before March, as noted by, among others, Belarusian political commentator Artyom Shraibman (Current Time TV, November 20). By then, not only will the... MORE

The Minsk Group: Karabakh War’s Diplomatic Casualty (Part One)
The 44-day war between Armenia and Azerbaijan (September 27–November 9) has resulted in an Azerbaijani national triumph, a Russian geopolitical and diplomatic victory over the West, and a conclusive discrediting of multilateral diplomacy as an instrument for conflict-resolution in and around the post-Soviet space (see... MORE

How Yerevan Walked Away From the ‘Basic Principles’ of Karabakh Conflict Settlement
Almost from the moment he came to power (2018), Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian rejected the “Basic Principles” worked out by the Minsk Group’s co-chairs (the United States, Russia, France) for resolving the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict over Karabakh. Tabled by the three co-chairing countries in 2009... MORE