Russian police are acting on the hypothesis that the powerful bomb that wrecked the car of First Deputy Finance Minister Andrei Vavilov on February 3 was intended to intimidate the minister. Vavilov handles the Finance Ministry's relations with commercial banks and his department is responsible... MORE

A Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman took issue on February 3 with the U.S. State Department's recent report criticizing Russia for its human rights record. (See Monitor, January 31) Mikhail Demurin complained that the document had not given weighty enough consideration to Russia's presidential elections, the... MORE

Despite warnings sounded by Russian prime minister Viktor Chernomyrdin (see Perspective section below), U.S. president Bill Clinton last night called NATO enlargement the Administration's top foreign policy priority for 1997 and pledged to follow through on alliance plans to expand membership by 1999. Clinton also... MORE

In a development that may herald a new stage in the inter-Tajik conflict, President Imomali Rahmonov and United Opposition chief of staff Dovlat Usmon met in Dushanbe yesterday to review progress in the implementation of last December's armistice agreement. Usmon and an opposition delegation verified... MORE

Georgia's Internal Affairs and State Security Ministries have announced the arrest of 12 members of a "terrorist group" that was said to be planning the assassination of President Eduard Shevardnadze and other officials. Most of those arrested are former members of Georgian State Security's Omega... MORE

At the first-ever French-Ukrainian summit, President Leonid Kuchma reportedly obtained assurances from French president Jacques Chirac and Foreign Minister Herve de Charette that Paris will support Kiev on a broad range of economic and political issues. Those issues include Ukraine's efforts to win delivery of... MORE

President Leonid Kuchma has informed NATO secretary-general Javier Solana and other Western leaders at the Davos (Switzerland) World Economic Forum that the relatively narrow scope of the Partnership for Peace program no longer meets Ukraine's needs. Kiev expects to sign a special partnership agreement with... MORE

In justifying the size of its once formidable military machine, the Soviet Union regularly compared its armed forces to those of the NATO countries in Òcorrelation of forcesÓ computations that were often highly suspect. The Russian air force, at least, seems intent on continuing this... MORE

The Kremlin continues to struggle to find a middle ground in its diplomatic dealings with Belgrade. Russian first deputy foreign minister Igor Ivanov, just recently returned from Belgrade, told reporters yesterday that the political crisis in Serbia is an internal matter that should be resolved... MORE

President Boris Yeltsin has condemned proposals for amending the constitution that are circulating in Moscow. Yeltsin's press spokesman said the president thought "It would do great harm to the state and society to start making changes to the constitution when it has been operating for... MORE