On February 19, 2014, the Third Session of the Trilateral Meeting of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey was held in Ganja (northwest Azerbaijan). After their ministerial—the first trilateral meeting following last year’s presidential elections in Azerbaijan and Georgia—the three sides adopted... MORE

Russia has seized Crimea from Ukraine by military force, wholly unprovoked, and without having to fire a shot (see EDM, February 28, March 3–7, 10). Furthermore, Russia has “legislated” its own right to intervene militarily in any part of Ukraine by unilateral decision of Russia’s... MORE

Since the Crimea crisis erupted, international attention focused naturally on Russian troop movements and signs of fresh moves by Moscow to isolate the Crimean Peninsula or step up the tempo of the military deployment into Ukrainian territory. However, during this period, Russia also initiated an... MORE

In January 2014, the chairman of the National Islamic Movement of Afghanistan party, General Abdul Rashid Dostum, a well-known politician and leader of ethnic Uzbeks in Afghanistan, made unofficial visits to Uzbekistan’s capital of Tashkent, the Kazakhstani capital of Astana, and Almaty—Kazakhstan’s largest city. According... MORE

On March 6, the government-funded company Northern Caucasus Resorts reported that the Russian Ministry for Regional Development approved including the Veduchi multi-purpose resort project in Chechnya’s special economic zone. The decision opens the way for investing in this enterprise under preferential conditions. According to the... MORE

From day one of Russia’s assault on Ukraine (ongoing since February 27), Ukrainian government leaders, politicians and diplomats have continually invoked the 1994 Budapest Memorandum signed by Ukraine, the United States, Russia and the United Kingdom. That Memorandum is widely believed to provide security “guarantees”... MORE

One unique feature of the still surging crisis in Ukraine is the intensity of high-level communications between the key parties to it—which should have eliminated the possibility of misunderstanding, but apparently has not. Last Friday night (March 7), United States President Barack Obama had yet... MORE

On March 4, Stefan Fule, the European Union’s Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighborhood Policy, came to Georgia on an official visit. He held high-level meetings with Georgian President Giorgi Margvelashvili, Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili, and Foreign Minister Maia Panjikidze (Channel 1 TV, Rustavi 2,... MORE

It has been obvious for years already that Moscow’s North Caucasus policy has been coordinated by one of the Kremlin’s working groups on the region. It has been unclear, however, whether this Kremlin working group on the North Caucasus was actually pursuing the same policy... MORE

On March 4, when President Vladimir Putin broke his public silence on events in Ukraine and Crimea, to many in Russia it seemed that the worst-case scenario of possible open hostilities and annexations was over. Crimea was, of course, occupied by Russian troops, but it... MORE