The Nenetsk Autonomous District, an oil-producing region in the northern part of European Russia, could become the first region in which President Vladimir Putin employs his power to remove governors. Nenetsk Governor Vladimir Butov has become the target of a criminal investigation, the first such... MORE

Russia's southern regions have seen a major upsurge in organized nationalistic activity. On April 16, the leadership body of the largest and most influential Cossack organization in Russia, the All-Powerful Don Host, called for persons who possess neither Russian citizenship nor local registration to be... MORE

The leader of Crimean Communists and speaker of Crimea's outgoing parliament, Leonid Hrach, is celebrating victory in Crimea's March 31 parliamentary elections. He had been disqualified for a faulty property declaration on February 25. His name, however, remained on the ballot, because the constituency commission... MORE

The findings of a Moldovan public opinion survey, the most comprehensive in recent years, go a long way toward explaining why the country went Red, why it keeps getting Redder, and why the Romanian-minded "right-wing" Christian Democrat People's Party (CDPP, the renamed Popular Front) has... MORE

Russian President Vladimir Putin's ambition to construct a CIS collective security organization seems set to make some political headway, in spite of the modest resources Russia is able to muster for the task. The week-long South-Antiterror 2002 exercises, just held in Central Asia, have exposed... MORE

Some nine years after Russians first began debating the question of alternative military service, the country's State Duma last week approved on first reading a contentious, government-backed bill that sets out the conditions under which Russian draft age youth will be able to choose civil... MORE

Federal security forces yesterday (April 21) carried out a large-scale "zachistka" (antiguerrilla sweep) in the Chechen capital of Djohar (Grozny). The operation coincided with the anniversary of the death of Djohar Dudaev, the first Chechen president, who was killed by a Russian rocket six years... MORE

President Vladimir Putin did not delve deeply into foreign or security affairs in yesterday's State of the Nation speech, but he did devote one portion of his address to a related issue that falls more properly under the rubric of domestic policy: the urgent need... MORE

President Vladimir Putin delivered the annual State of the Nation address in the Kremlin yesterday before an audience of 1,000, including Russia's parliamentarians and other top officials and dignitaries. He listed a number of the "achievements" of his administration and cabinet over the past year--a... MORE

A key point President Vladimir Putin's annual State of the Nation address yesterday (April 18) was "the rise of extremism," which he called a "serious threat" to Russia's stability and security. This extremism, he said, is expressed "above all in slogans and fascist and nationalist... MORE