Potential large shale gas deposits in Europe have raised hopes that the old continent may in the future rely less on oil and natural gas imports from Russia. However, fears of potential environmental effects of hydraulic fracturing and the lack of a clear policy by... MORE

No one could have predicted a scandal would erupt when, on April 3, the Russian National Anti-Terrorist Committee (NAK) reported that security forces had killed five rebels in Ingushetia’s main city, Nazran. The authorities acknowledged there was a woman among the slain rebels. According to... MORE

Ukrainian prosecutors announced last week that former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko (2005; 2007-2010) and former Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko (1996-1997) were suspected of commissioning several murders in the 1990s. This looks like a last-ditch attempt to influence public opinion – both at home, ahead of... MORE

After Bulgaria (see EDM, January 24), Romania might unnecessarily miss its own chance to explore a promising shale gas potential in partnership with the Chevron Corporation. Unlike the Bulgarian situation, Romanian protests against shale gas exploration are peripheral, outside the political system, and not backed... MORE

Moscow has again proposed formal multilateral cooperation with NATO. On April 6, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov arrived in Astana to attend the council of foreign ministers of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), ahead of the CSTO summit in Moscow on May 15. Lavrov... MORE

Interest is growing among Western gas producers in Azerbaijan, transit companies, and European importers in the Trans-Anatolia project for Caspian gas to Europe. Initiated by Baku as an Azerbaijani-Turkish project, the Trans-Anatolia Gas Pipeline (Turkic acronym: TANAP) is planned to run from the Georgian-Turkish border... MORE

Interested parties are considering joining, in one way or another, the Azerbaijani-Turkish Trans-Anatolia Gas Pipeline project (Turkic acronym: TANAP) across Turkey to the European Union’s border. Some of the same interested parties are competing against each other to provide a continuation route for TANAP into... MORE

On April 6, the president of Dagestan, Magomedsalam Magomedov, met with Russian Deputy Interior Minister Sergei Gerasimov in Makhachkala. The chief police official of the North Caucasus Federal District, Sergei Chenchik, and the chief of the Russian Interior Ministry’s police aviation and special units, Vladimir... MORE

A major advantage of the scheme for consensual rotation between Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and President Dmitri Medvedev by the means of presidential elections was supposed to be a low intensity of infighting in the common court over which they jointly rule. It has not... MORE

Suspected militants have attacked police in Kabardino-Balkaria and Ingushetia, with the latter republic experiencing a recent uptick in insurgency-related violence.In Kabardino-Balkaria today (April 6), two suspected rebels who attacked a police officer were killed in a special operation in Nalchik. According to local authorities, the... MORE