Vyacheslau Kebich, independent Belarus's first prime minister, reportedly is a leading candidate to replace Myacheslau Hryb as speaker in a new national parliament after the November 29 repeat elections. Hryb has challenged president Aleksandr Lukashenko by referring unlawful presidential decrees to the Constitutional Court and... MORE

President Leonid Kuchma has readily accepted a proposal to create a temporary commission to look into ethnic problems in Crimea. Refat Chubarov, deputy chairman of the Crimean Tatar Mejlis (assembly), submitted the proposal during President Kuchma's meeting on November 13 with national-cultural association leaders representing... MORE

A new round of Russian-Estonian border demarcation talks, held in Tallinn November 14 and 15, failed again to advance toward a mutually acceptable political and legal solution. Estonia renewed its offer to drop claims to approximately 2,000 square kilometers of land which were annexed to... MORE

On November 15, the Federation Council set the date of Sunday, June 16, 1996 for Russia's next presidential elections. The date was set in an attempt to refute persistent rumors that President Yeltsin will try to cancel the presidential elections because he--and members of his... MORE

At least 16 Russian soldiers were officially reported killed between November 13 and 15 in fighting in Chechnya. Yesterday Russian forces inflicted civilian casualties during a mop-up operation against resistance fighters in parts of Grozny, and in the shelling of villages in contested parts of... MORE

President Boris Yeltsin's senior political aide Georgi Satarov said on November 14 that "although the president wants the Duma election to be held on time, he would like to see the election law changed before the scheduled election date of December 17." Satarov said Yeltsin... MORE

Prime Minister Viktor Chenomyrdin met on Thursday with the editors of major Russian media outlets, and told them that they would soon be the beneficiaries of new government largesse. He announced a package of tax and other financial benefits for media organizations, and at the... MORE

Col. General Leonty Shevtsov, slated to command Russia's peacekeeping troops in ex-Yugoslavia, and to serve as deputy commander of multinational forces there under a US general, has impressive credentials-but not necessarily in peacekeeping. Shevtsov was the chief of staff of Russia's combined forces in Chechnya... MORE

The presidents of Russia and Kazakhstan, Boris Yeltsin and Nursultan Nazarbayev, papered over disputed issues at a meeting yesterday. Nazarbayev, on a stopover on his way to Paris, became the first foreign leader to visit Yeltsin in the hospital--strictly as a courtesy, he insisted. Yeltsin,... MORE

Another round of Russian and OSCE-mediated negotiations among Armenia, Karabakh, and Azerbaijan to settle the Karabakh conflict ended in Moscow November 12, without advancing toward a proposed comprehensive political agreement. Again, the main stumbling block was the problem of Lachin corridor, an Azerbaijani area which... MORE