Last month, the Croatian government signed up to Gazprom’s South Stream pipeline project; it agreed to re-start importing certain gas volumes from Gazprom through existing pipelines from 2013 onward; it welcomed Gazprom’s offers to build jointly-owned power plants in Croatia; heard an unexpected proposal for... MORE

This week, the Moscow political elite was shocked by the resignation of three Duma deputies from the ruling United Russia (UR) party: chairman of the Duma ethics committee Vladimir Pekhtin as well as deputies Anatoly Lomakin and Vasiliy Tolstopyatov. All were previously accused by opposition... MORE

On February 8, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev held a government commission meeting in the city of Cherkessk, Karachaevo-Cherkessia on the socio-economic development of the North Caucasus. The commission called for investing additional funds—nearly $3 billion—through 2020 into the region’s agricultural development. Chechen leader Ramzan... MORE

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