Pakistani officials announced yesterday that Taliban leaders have agreed with Pakistan's Foreign Secretary, Naimuddin Sheik, to support the projected pipeline that would bring Turkmen gas via Afghanistan and Pakistan to terminals on the Indian Ocean for export. They also agreed to upgrade the road which... MORE

Former prime minister Yegor Gaidar told Russian TV that last week's vote by the upper house of the Russian parliament, declaring the Crimean port of Sevastopol to be Russian territory, was dangerous because it threatened Ukrainian-Russian relations and ran counter to Russia's international commitments (specifically,... MORE

Gubernatorial elections took place yesterday in ten Russian regions ranging from Khabarovsk in the far east to Arkhangelsk in the north. Preliminary results show Communist and nationalist candidates winning in Bryansk, Kurgan, Vladimir, and Voronezh oblasts, and leading in Ryazan oblast, where a Communist was... MORE

Some half million residents of Kostroma, 250 miles northeast of Moscow, voted Sunday against the construction of a nuclear power plant in their rural region. The vote was unprecedented since all the candidates in the gubernatorial election held on the same day had promised to... MORE

In an address to the Russian Duma on December 6, Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin said that defense production over the next four years would be concentrated in a limited number of enterprises and research centers. Chernomyrdin also said that defense spending priorities would gradually shift... MORE

Boris Yeltsin's press spokesman announced on December 6 that German chancellor Helmut Kohl would travel to Moscow on January 4 for a brief round of talks with the recovering Russian president. A day later a spokesman for French president Jacques Chirac reported that the French... MORE

A senior Russian diplomat warned on December 5 that Russia would consider using its veto in the UN Security Council if the West pushes for a reimposition of sanctions on Belgrade. That same sentiment was echoed a day later when Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov repeated... MORE

The commander of the Syrian Air Force has requested that Russia modernize Syria's Russian-built MiG-21 jet fighters, according to Lt. Gen. Yuri Klishin, deputy commander of the Russian Air Force. Klishin met the Syrian officer last Friday at a weapons exposition in India. Syria is... MORE

An official of the Russian Atomic Energy Ministry has charged that the U.S. had pledged to supply his ministry with two supercomputers in return for Russia's signature on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTB). The computers can simulate nuclear explosions and Moscow wants them to... MORE

Some 3,000 people rallied yesterday in central Minsk for democracy and national independence and against "dictatorship." The lawful parliament's chairman, Syamyon Sharetski, together with senior MPs and Popular Front leaders addressed the demonstrators, who also marched to the Russian embassy to protest against Moscow's official... MORE