New recruits to the Russian police will soon undergo mandatory polygraph tests in order to gain admission to the force. The requirement, introduced in June 2012 as part of a comprehensive reform of the police, will now be introduced in practice (https://izvestia.ru/news/528950). The Russian Ministry... MORE

While Minsk has been recently trying its best to revive its relationships with the West (see EDM, February 13), reciprocal steps have not yet been undertaken by the Western countries and international structures. On the contrary, on February 8, the EU proposed that Belarus’s human... MORE

Croatia is expected to join the European Union as a full member in July of this year. In the energy sector, however, Croatia’s center-left government is marking the EU accession in its own ways: First, by joining Gazprom’s South Stream pipeline project, in breach of... MORE

On February 15, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili’s United National Movement (UNM) party, as part of a power-sharing agreement, confirmed its proposal to the ruling Georgian Dream (GD) coalition that a large part of the new constitutional provisions should go into effect now, instead of in... MORE

United States plans to link the countries of Central Asia by new rail lines with Afghanistan. At the same time, Washington opposes neither the construction of a railway corridor from Central Asia through Iran, nor Chinese extensions of its national rail system into the area.... MORE

Colonel-General Valery Gerasimov, the chief of the General Staff, recently addressed a military security conference in Moscow organized jointly by the relevant committees in the Duma and Federation Council with support from the project “Science XXI Research on the Promotion of Security.” Not surprisingly, Gerasimov... MORE

On December 25, 2012, the state commission tasked by the government of Kyrgyzstan to analyze the legal situation around the Kumtor gold mine unveiled its official conclusions. This commission was formed back in July, following a decree by the country’s parliament that mandated the need... MORE

On February 12, a Russian presidential decree came into force that permits sending conscript soldiers to combat zones after a mere three months of training plus one month of regular service. The decree was not published on the Russian president’s official website, but instead was... MORE

The meteor that exploded over Chelyabinsk in the early hours of February 15, as damaging as it was, produced even more jokes than material destruction. One of those was about the State Duma urgently approving legislation banning the incursions of celestial bodies because of their... MORE

In recent years, Kazakhstan has made an effort to deepen and expand cooperation with the world’s Islamic community. The focus has been on economic and cultural ties, but political and security issues have also been prominent due to the large number of internal and regional... MORE