On May 2nd, a group of international experts presented their view of Kyrgyzstan’s violence in June 2010, which took the lives of 470 and displaced over 400,000 people. Finish MP Kimmo Kiljunen reported findings of the Kyrgyzstan Inquiry Commission (KIC) in Bishkek, summarizing over five... MORE

April was an extremely successful month for the Russian security forces in the North Caucasus, following the liquidation of Israpil Validzhanov, the leader of the Dagestani jamaat on April 18, and of Emir Mukhannad, a well-known Arab volunteer in the ranks of the Chechen armed... MORE

Russian officials reacted favorably to the killing of the al-Qaeda terrorist network leader Osama bin Laden by SEAL commandos during a raid of a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. The Kremlin congratulated the United States with a “serious success in the fight against international terrorism” and... MORE

(Part Two) The issue of seasonal “forced” labor in the Uzbek cotton harvest has been taken up by the International Labor Organization (ILO) where it belongs. It appears that G-TIP has taken a UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) checklist to come to the conclusion... MORE

Ukraine has launched talks to revise the January 2009 gas contract with Russia according to which the base price was hiked from $179 to $450 per 1,000 cubic meters of gas. Kyiv hopes the contract will be revised by the end of the summer. Ukraine’s... MORE

On April 30, ethnic Shapsug representatives held a conference in Sochi. The Shapsugs are a tiny remnant of the numerous Circassian tribes who were once the sole inhabitants of the Sochi region and much of the western North Caucasus plains before the Russians overran the... MORE

NATO leaders seem aware of the imperative to escalate the air campaign for a swift successful end to the Libya war, admittedly at the cost of collateral damage. This has become increasingly noticeable in recent days. Russia, which had helped usher NATO into this trap... MORE

(Part One)Since the May 2005 armed uprising in Andijan, the US has been slowly rebuilding its relationship with Uzbekistan, culminating most recently in the Uzbek government’s almost instantaneous agreement to allow its territory to be used by the US Department of Defense as a key... MORE

With the onset of warm weather, radical opposition groups in Tbilisi plan their seasonal regime-change campaign. Judging by their latest declarations, their tactic remains unchanged since 2007: instigating disorder in the capital’s streets to provoke the authorities into using force, hoping thereby to de-legitimize the... MORE

US proposals to reduce tactical nuclear weapons are being carefully and consistently downplayed by Moscow. Mikhail Margelov, head of the Federation Council’s International Affairs Committee expressed skepticism on the issue following a series of meetings with US defense officials in Washington. Mergelov characterized Moscow’s stance... MORE