Kazakhstan's president Nursultan Nazarbayev, accompanied by a large governmental delegation, conferred in Baku and Tbilisi with his counterparts, Haydar Aliev and Eduard Shevardnadze, on developing cooperation among the Transcaucasus and Central Asian states. The presidents focused on the transport of "early" Caspian oil and the... MORE

The Georgian parliament's Foreign Relations Committee chairman, Kakha Chitaya, stated on national television that the parliament intends shortly to discuss revisions to the unratified 1994 agreements on the stationing of Russian troops in Georgia and joint protection of the Georgian-Turkish border. Georgia no longer needs... MORE

Russian Security Council secretary Aleksandr Lebed met with Viktor Chernomyrdin on September 18 to brief the prime minister on the results of his meetings with Chechen leaders the day before. The two men focused on the problem of forcibly held persons in Chechnya and the... MORE

The inaugural session of the Russian-Moldovan intergovernmental commission for economic cooperation produced a debt-rescheduling agreement for most of Moldova's $430 million worth of debts to Russia, incurred mainly for fuel deliveries and owed mostly to Gazprom. Moldova agreed to repay the debt within seven years,... MORE

Russia's Defense Ministry, which has long complained of being the worst financed of the country's "power ministries," made public some figures on September 17 that seemed to support its contention. According to the ministry's information service, the regular armed forces received only 4.4 percent of... MORE

Latvia's parliament chairwoman, Ilga Kreituse, has been forced to resign from the Owners' Democratic party (Samnieks, the single largest in parliament) and is expected to step down from the parliament's chair. Her husband, Finance Minister Aivars Kreituss, who is a member of the same party,... MORE

Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev told a Tbilisi news conference, held jointly with Georgian president Eduard Shevardnadze, that Kazakhstan would leave the CIS customs union "as soon as" it is admitted to full membership in the World Trade Organization. Regarding their countries' membership in the CIS... MORE

The speaker of the Russian Duma has used the 96th conference of the Interparliamentary Union as a platform to launch a Cold-War style attack on the U.S. and the West. In a speech to assembled delegates in Beijing on September 17, Gennady Seleznev condemned the... MORE

The South Korean armed forces have decided to equip a motorized battalion with 30 Russian-made BMP-3 combat vehicles and with other Russian weaponry, Defense Ministry officials announced in Seoul on September 17. The decision, which is connected to a deal whereby Russia is supplying South... MORE

Russia and the U.S. have reportedly agreed upon several practical steps to advance technical cooperation in meeting guidelines spelled out in the 1995 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The International Atomic Energy Agency announced that U.S. energy secretary Hazel O'Leary and Russian atomic energy minister Viktor Mikhailov,... MORE