According to the newspaper Nezavisimaya gazeta, the Russian authorities' investigation into the apartment building explosions in Moscow, Volgodonsk and Buinaksk in the fall of 1999 has concluded that the blasts were organized by terrorists who had passed through terrorist training centers set up by the... MORE

Ukraine's Deputy Energy Premier Yulia Tymoshenko did not, contrary to expectations, run in the parliamentary by-elections on June 25. It had been anticipated that the pressure of "oligarchs" against her energy reform plans would drive her back to parliament (see the Monitor, May 17), but... MORE

Cooperative Partner-2000, a naval, air and amphibious exercise, has been underway since June 19 in Ukrainian waters of the northwestern Black Sea and on land near Odessa. This is the most ample joint exercise hosted by Ukraine since it became independent. It is, by the... MORE

After surging at the end of 1998 and through much of 1999, inflation has slowed rapidly in 2000. Data released in May indicate that consumer prices actually fell during February, March and April, by 0.2, 0.1 and 0.2 percent, respectively (Russian agencies, May 24). Year-on-year... MORE

Some sixty U.S. Army medical personnel and 100 Georgian counterparts practiced battlefield medical treatment at a Georgian military base from June 16 to June 21--the first joint exercise on Georgian territory, five years after the country joined NATO's Partnership for Peace program. The U.S.-financed exercise... MORE

ballistic missile defense plans reappeared in the headlines yesterday after Moscow proposed publicly that Russian specialists work with their Norwegian counterparts at a controversial radar site located some forty miles from the Russian border. The proposal, which Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov made during a... MORE

Media-Most head Vladimir Gusinsky has been asked to appear for questioning today at the Prosecutor General's Office in connection with the case against him for alleged large-scale embezzlement. According to his lawyers, Gusinsky received the summons yesterday evening. On June 20, the Tverskaia intermunicipal court... MORE

The All-Russian Center for the Study of Public Option (VTsIOM) has released a poll reflecting the views of Muscovites toward the arrest and jailing of Media-Most chief Vladimir Gusinsky. The poll was taken on June 21 among approximately 500 adult residents of the Russian capital.... MORE

The June 19-21 summit of the CIS brought to light some changes and innovations in the Kremlin's approach to this organization (see yesterday's Monitor). An emphasis on bilateral relations and Russian-led subregional groups, as opposed to multilateralism, had been introduced at the January summit, Vladimir... MORE

Russia's President Vladimir Putin initiated a meeting on January 20 between himself and Presidents Eduard Shevardnadze of Georgia, Haidar Aliev of Azerbaijan and Robert Kocharian of Armenia on the sidelines of the CIS summit. It was a rerun of the meeting held by the same... MORE