At a Kiev briefing October 17, Foreign Ministry chief spokesman Yuri Serhiev came out against the deployment of nuclear weapons on the territories of countries in Ukraine's vicinity which seek to join NATO. Such deployment would place Ukraine "on the line of confrontation" between an... MORE

The Inspector General of the German army, General Klaus Naumann, conferred in Riga with Latvia's prime minister and defense minister Maris Gailis and the acting army commander, Lt. General Juris Eihmanis, on initiating German military assistance to Latvia. The German supreme commander presented plans to... MORE

. Konstantin Zatulin, chairman of the State Duma Committee for the CIS and Relations with Compatriots, appears to have little use for Federation Council members who are currently promoting the holding of a national referendum on Russian-Belarusian integration. Zatulin said October 17 that the deputies... MORE

According to the Zhirinovsky party's Maj. General (ret.) Viktor Filatov, campaigning for a Duma seat in the Chukotka peninsula situated just across the Bering Strait from Alaska, "local leaders and businessmen are getting used to the thought that it one can survive not with Moscow,... MORE

In downtown Kazan, the Tatar republic capital, approximately 100 Moslem Tatar students led by a mufti have seized a public building which used to be a mosque and religious seminary before the Soviet period. The demonstrators demand that the building be returned to religious pursuits.... MORE

Russia's Central Electoral Commission (TsIK) chairman Nikolai Ryabov announced yesterday that it does not recognize the validity of the Kalmyk republic's October 15 election of president Kirsan Ilyumzhinov to a second, seven-year term. The commission objected to the fact that Ilyumzhinov ran unopposed and to... MORE

Russia's defense and internal affairs ministries, Federal Security Service, North Caucasus military district headquarters, and the joint command of Russian forces in Chechnya are all cited by the October 17 Izvestiya as resolutely disclaiming any knowledge of the October 14 air attacks on Dargo and... MORE

Russia's internal affairs ministry recently conducted a country-wide operation against what it calls "ethnic crime," a leading Russian weekly Kontinent reports. The two-week operation is said to have netted 1,500 alleged criminals and claimed to have solved 20,000 crimes. The operation was billed as prevention... MORE

Political writer Andrei Nuykin and economist Pavel Bunich, Duma deputies long known nationwide as promoters of reforms, have withdrawn from the parliamentary group "Russia's Choice" over vaguely described policy differences. (2) They are but the latest distinguished members of Russia's Choice to leave it. Those... MORE

Yesterday's Moscow meeting of the five-power Contact Group on Moscow collided head on with Russia's familiar objections to the Western countries' peace plan. Russia again insisted on sharing operational command of the planned peacekeeping operation, demanding that it be placed under UN political authority. Moscow... MORE