Latest Monitor Articles
BALTIC NATIONS HOLD FIRST JOINT MILITARY EXERCISE.
The integrated Baltic Battalion (BaltBat), the first joint military force of the three Baltic states, held its first combat exercise from January 29 to February 9 at the Adazi training grounds in Latvia. It was the largest military exercise held in the Baltic states since... MORE
MOSCOW EQUATES CHECHEN REBELS WITH THE IRA.
A member of the Russian Presidential Council declared yesterday that recent developments in Chechnya and the February 9 London bombing by the IRA compelled the world community to rally against terrorism. A Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman, while not explicitly linking the two acts, responded to... MORE
THREE SEPARATE COMMISSIONS TO MAKE POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS ON CHECHNYA.
A Security Council meeting February 7-8, chaired by Boris Yeltsin, considered seven possible scenarios to resolve the conflict in Chechnya. Negotiation with Djohar Dudayev was, however, ruled out by Yeltsin. The Council tasked Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin to chair an interdepartmental commission that within two... MORE
NTV SAYS IT HAS BEEN DENIED ACCESS TO KREMLIN.
Russia's independent television station NTV says it has been indefinitely banned from the Kremlin. (6) No reason was given, but last week NTV screened two interviews with Vyacheslav Kostikov, who served from 1992 till 1994 as President Boris Yeltsin's press secretary. Kostikov aroused the anger... MORE
ZHIRINOVSKY’S DEPUTY ATTACKED.
The deputy leader of Russia's Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR), Aleksandr Vengerovsky, was shot and wounded in the knee as he walked his poodle outside his apartment in downtown Moscow yesterday evening. (8) Vengerovsky, who chairs the Duma Subcommittee on Foreign Intelligence, was not seriously hurt.... MORE
GERMAN MP CALLS FOR RELEASE OF RUSSIAN NAVAL OFFICER.
A member of the German parliament urged Moscow yesterday to free a retired Russian naval officer arrested in St. Petersburg February 6 for alleged espionage. Wolfgang Behrendt argued that the arrest violates the human rights of the retired officer, Aleksandr Nikitin, and called upon the... MORE
FRENCH PRIME MINISTER PREVIEWS MOSCOW AGENDA.
In a long interview with Izvestiya on the eve of a three-day visit to Moscow, French prime minister Alain Juppe intimated that Russians should vote for Boris Yeltsin because he had shepherded Russia through a difficult economic transition, the results of which were only now... MORE
YELTSIN LAYS OUT FOREIGN POLICY INTERESTS.
President Boris Yeltsin told a group of foreign diplomats yesterday that Moscow expects the international community to respect Russia's "legitimate interests," whether the issue at hand is "Europe's security structure, support for world trade, or integration of CIS states." Yeltsin described Russia as a link... MORE
RUSSIAN DEFENSE MINISTER BELLIGERENT ON NATO ENLARGEMENT.
Defense Minister Pavel Grachev told reporters in Belgrade February 9 that Russia would be compelled to take measures aimed "at strengthening its own security" if NATO chose to "ignore Russian interests" and expanded to the East. Those measures, he said, would include a search for... MORE