Perhaps most emblematic of what many see as a drift toward at least partially restoring the pre-December 1991 system was the Russian president's decision to resurrect the national anthem written by the composer Aleksandr Aleksandrov and adopted by Josef Stalin in 1943. Putin, in a... MORE

In the foreign policy arena, this past fortnight closed with the release of convicted U.S. spy Edmond Pope from Russia's Lefortovo prison following a pardon granted by Putin. The Russian action removed what had been an increasingly serious point of friction in relations between Russia... MORE

The emerging thrust of Russian foreign policy was evidenced even by the location from which Putin announced the pardoning of Pope: Havana, Cuba. The Russian president began a three-day visit to the former Soviet client state on December 13 which, in both its timing (amid... MORE

In late November and early December, President Alyaksandr Lukashenka carried out a comprehensive reshuffle at the top of the Belarusan KGB (still so named), the Security Council, and the Internal and Foreign Affairs Ministries. Lukashenka ensured ample publicity for the changes, except for one detail:... MORE

The presidents of eleven CIS member countries--all but Turkmenistan--held a summit conference on December 1 in Minsk. The unprecedently sparse agenda included an "inventarizatsiya"--stock-taking, in Soviet/Russian bureaucratic idiom--of unimplemented decisions and lapsed agreements from past CIS summits. The Minsk summit officially buried no fewer than... MORE

...While the question "Who is Mr. Putin?" has yet to be answered definitively, there is a growing sense in Russia that Putinism, its rhetoric notwithstanding, is turning out to be little more than Yeltsinism with some new faces. Indeed, while Vladimir Putin began his first... MORE

In fact, Putin, like his predecessor, appeared to be having a hard time imposing order on his own inner circle, let alone on far-off Tatarstan or Chuvashia. One sign that a full-scale power struggle was going on inside the government were law enforcement raids on... MORE

The hints of upheaval in Russia's domestic political scene appear not to have spilled over--at least not yet--into Moscow's conduct of foreign policy. Indeed, Russian activities in this area have gone into overdrive in recent weeks and would seem, if anything, to reflect a new... MORE

Russia also found itself at loggerheads with European and North American governments during a ministerial meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) held in Vienna on November 27-28. Moscow clashed sharply with other OSCE states over their criticism of the Kremlin's... MORE

In advance of the December 1 summit in Minsk of the CIS, the pro-Western GUUAM countries--Georgia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan and Moldova--are acting as a group outside the CIS to protect their imperiled independence. GUUAM's coordinated policy was especially in evidence at the annual OSCE ministerial... MORE