Many might dismiss the beating of a 57-year-old imam in rural Chuvashia (Regnum, May 7) as a minor local episode. But in fact, it threatens to open a dramatic, violent and potentially explosive new phase in efforts by Talgat Tajuddin, the last mufti in the... MORE

Pressed by economic and geopolitical imperatives, Italy is trying to carve out its own diplomatic space over the crisis in Ukraine, in an apparent attempt at fostering a rapprochement between the European Union and Russia. The Russian annexation of the Ukrainian autonomous region of Crimea... MORE

*To read Part One, please click here. The re-election of President Nursultan Nazarbayev (see EDM, April 30, May 8) has renewed and bolstered the presidential institution’s popular mandate to tackle the urgent challenges confronting Kazakhstan. Some of these challenges are recurrent, but for the most... MORE

On April 25, after months of public scandals and brawls, the Terek Cossacks elected a new ataman (chieftain). The Cossacks confirmed the only candidate for the position, Alexander Zhuravsky, as the new head of the Terek Cossack Force. The election of the new ataman was... MORE

The Victory Day parade on the Red Square in Moscow last Saturday (May 9) was a glorious and perfectly smooth affair, which duly filled the hearts of millions of Russians with habitual pride for the military might of the country. President Vladimir Putin basked in... MORE

Sitting at a strategic crossroads between Europe and East Asia, Mongolia and North Korea are potential economic corridors for the wider Eurasian landmass. However, the realization of such corridors depends in large part on Chinese and Russian policy priorities, since both have long-standing geostrategic interests... MORE

After each death of a Chechen in Syria or Iraq, the involvement of Chechens in Middle Eastern conflicts becomes a hot topic of discussion in the Russian media. The recent death of a high-profile Chechens from the Northern Front of the Islamic State (IS) organization,... MORE

On April 26, 2015, Kazakhstan held its fifth presidential election in a quarter-century of independent statehood (see EDM, April 30). Incumbent President Nursultan Nazarbayev was re-elected overwhelmingly for another five-year term, as pre-election opinion polls and Nazarbayev’s popularity ratings with Kazakhstan’s voters had foreshadowed. His... MORE

Dagestan is a special region of Russia in that it is an outpost of Islamic radicalism. Islamic institutions, madrasas and maktabs (Islamic elementary schools in mosques) exist in large numbers in the republic. Even though the number of Islamic educational institutions in the republic has... MORE

The Embassy of the Russian Federation in Uzbekistan has announced that between April 27 and May 8, to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany in the Great Patriotic War of 1941–1945, embassy staff would distribute free “ribbons of St.... MORE