President Boris Yeltsin spent yesterday seemingly trying to limit the damage from the Federation Council's March 17 vote to reject Prosecutor General Yuri Skuratov's resignation and RTR state television's subsequent airing of a sex video allegedly starring Skuratov. Yeltsin yesterday appointed an interagency commission under... MORE

Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Maslyukov, back in Moscow after several days of talks earlier this week with Japanese officials, said yesterday that his trip to Tokyo had been "useful" and had helped the two countries move forward on a number of joint economic... MORE

Moscow has continued by and large to stand by Belgrade over the past two days, despite the unwillingness of Serbian authorities to sign onto the Kosovo peace settlement agreement and their apparent preparations for a major military thrust into Kosovo. As the peace talks in... MORE

Russia's Foreign Ministry yesterday denounced a U.S. Senate vote which advanced the United States farther down the path toward deploying a national missile defense system. On March 17 senators voted overwhelmingly to approve legislation committing the United States to build a system which would defend... MORE

Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Tofig Zulfugarov's four-day visit to Iran, just completed, has occasioned a full airing of the two countries' serious disagreements, but equally highlighted their willingness to prevent these disagreements from degenerating into confrontation. The main goals of Zulfugarov's visit were to raise Iranian... MORE

Yesterday the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) managers recommended that the IMF board, which is scheduled to meet by the end of March, resume the US$2.2 billion Extended Fund Facility (EFF) program for Ukraine. If the board does resume the program, Ukraine will probably receive the... MORE

The three election-winning conservative parties (see the Monitor, March 8) signed yesterday an agreement on the formation of Estonia's new government and on its program. The parties are: the Pro Patria Union, the Reform Party and the Moderates, holding eighteen, eighteen and seventeen seats, respectively,... MORE

The status of the CIS executive secretarial post has become an object of confused speculation following Russian President Boris Yeltsin's unilateral "decision"--widely recognized as unlawful--to dismiss Boris Berezovsky from it. Berezovsky, currently in the United States on a speaking tour, insists that he remains the... MORE

Russian President Boris Yeltsin yesterday proposed a tentative agenda and date--April 2--for a CIS summit. The date is being submitted to the eleven other presidents for approval. Originally scheduled for last October, the summit was to have focused on streamlining the CIS, but has been... MORE

Diplomatic delegations from Russia and North Korea yesterday initialed a long-negotiated interstate treaty which both sides hailed as a step toward building stronger economic and political ties. The document will replace a 1961 friendship treaty between the Soviet Union and North Korea which was scrapped... MORE