To date, there have been only 10 volunteers for the 130 placesin the Latvian company of the Western-funded Baltic PeacekeepingBattalion, BNS reported July 6. Riga officials said that unfortunatemedia publicity about service in the military was to blame. Latvia, Lithuania Agree to Share Baltic Oil... MORE

Ata summit meeting in Vilnius, the presidents of Latvia and Lithuaniaagreed to share any oil found under the Baltic sea in the areawhich both countries now claim, BNS reported July 5. Profits fromthis oil--if it can be commercially developed--had powered thesea border dispute between the... MORE

In language strikinglydifferent from that he has used before and apparently reflectinghis anger that Russia is not willing to subsidize the Belarusianeconomy, President Aleksandr Lukashenko complained to

On July1, Belarusian president Aleksandr Lukashenko cut all funding forthe old and new Supreme Soviets and for local government bodiesas well, Obshchaya gazeta (no. 27) reported. The paperadded that the 119 deputies elected to the new parliament wereshowing little interest in taking their place. Two... MORE

Belarus will create, andRussia will finance, a special police unit to stop thefts fromthe main export pipeline carrying Russian oil westward acrossBelarus, officials in Minsk told the Petroleum Information AgencyJuly 6. Criminal groups are tapping oil products from this andother pipelines by drilling holes in... MORE

Moscow is discussingwith Kiev the content, but not yet the date, of Yeltsin´slong delayed visit to Ukraine, Russian foreign minister AndreiKozyrev said July 6, adding that the visit still requires "seriouspreparations" in the form of "a package of concreteagreements" to implement earlier Russian-Ukrainian accords.Because Moscow... MORE

Elected as chairmanof Crimea´s Supreme Soviet by a vote of 58 to 31, YevhenSuprunyuk pledged in his acceptance speech to act within the frameworkof Ukrainian law, observe Ukrainian sovereignty, seek Kiev´sprior consent to Crimean contacts with Russia, and encourage theadoption of the draft Crimean constitution.... MORE

The chairman of the Moldovan parliament´s foreign affairscommission, Dumitru Diacov, told Basapress July 6 that Chisinauhas decided against submitting the CIS human rights conventionto parliament for ratification, pending a verdict by the Councilof Europe. President Mircea Snegur signed the convention at theCIS summit in May... MORE

Very preliminary returnssuggest that Armenian voters have approved the new constitutionand given a working majority in the parliament to the party ofPresident Levon Ter-Petrosian, Itar-Tass and Noyan Tapan reportedJuly 6. Full returns will not be available for several more days,and official returns not for more... MORE

Elaborating on Georgianpresident Eduard Shevardnadze's recent remarks, Tbilisi's ambassadorin Moscow Vazha Lodkipanidze told Russian journalists July 6 thatGeorgia is now prepared to negotiate federal arrangements withAbkhazia and South Ossetia. He said that Tbilisi was preparedto give Abkhazia broader powers than the various subjects of theRussian... MORE