On September 1, 2017, President Petro Poroshenko announced that the National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) would issue instructions to tighten and strengthen Ukrainian borders, a major feature of which would be the stringent requirement that Russian citizens possess biometric passports when entering Ukraine (President.gov.ua,... MORE

The recent involvement of the Russian Federal Security Service’s (FSB) cryptography specialists in international efforts to instrumentalize emerging currencies such as Bitcoin and Ether (Iso.org, accessed September 11) shows how profoundly the official Russian position on cyber technology has shifted in the past year. It... MORE

The fast-escalating crisis in East Asia, driven by the chain of nuclear and missile provocations by the North Korean regime, has upset the carefully prepared agendas of regional politics. In early September, North Korea cast a shadow over talks at the BRICS (a loose political... MORE

After a break prompted by war and economic collapse in 2014–2015, Ukraine restarted its privatization campaign in August 2017. The local privatization body, the State Property Fund (SPF), sold only five out of the state’s eight 25 percent stakes in the regional power-supply and generation... MORE

The United States’ ambassador to Yerevan, Richard M. Mills, praised the participation of an Armenian unit in the US-led Noble Partner 2017 exercise, held on July 30 to August 12, in Georgia, along with Georgian, British, German, Slovenian, Turkish and Ukrainian military forces. Ambassador Mills... MORE

The development of electronic warfare (EW) capabilities is a strategic priority for Russia (see EDM, July 19). And Moscow’s preparations for the upcoming Zapad 2017 war games (September 14–20) have reconfirmed this observation. Over the past several months, Russian forces have carried out a series... MORE

Not only beauty is in the eye of the beholder. In the absence of attention-grabbing cataclysms, the most talked about issue related to Belarus depends on who you ask. Thus, ordinary Belarusians are mostly preoccupied with price hikes, the cost of utilities in particular, and... MORE

The question of where to secure dependable energy supplies for the countries of Central and Eastern Europe was notably broached during United States President Donald Trump’s July visit to Poland. During his meeting with regional leaders in Warsaw, Trump stated that fast-growing US natural gas... MORE

Speaking to journalists after the conclusion of the latest leadership summit of the so-called BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), held in Xiamen, China, President Vladimir Putin threatened to continue the tit-for-tat cycle of diplomatic expulsions and diplomatic property takeovers with the... MORE

The Embassy of the United States in Tbilisi, the capital city of Georgia, has announced that it is ready to issue US visas to Russian citizens, if they apply to the embassy with such a request (News.am, August 26). The statement by the US diplomatic... MORE