President Leonid Kuchma yesterday forwarded to the Verkhovna Rada for ratification the Ukrainian-Russian agreements on the partition of the ex-Soviet Black Sea Fleet. The documents were signed by Kuchma with Russian President Boris Yeltsin in Kyiv on May 28, 1997 after five years of negotiations.... MORE

A new scandal is brewing over reported tension between Sergei Dubinin's Central Bank and Mikhail Zadornov's Finance Ministry. In a August 6 article, Nezavisimaya gazeta charged that the Central Bank triggered a crisis on July 20 by withdrawing 8.7 billion rubles (US$1.5 billion) in funds... MORE

Figures just released for Russian economic performance in the first half of the year show that the financial crisis that began last October has caused a prolongation of the country's eight-year economic recession. In the first six months of 1998, GDP fell by 0.5 percent... MORE

The blustering rhetoric of the government of Prime Minister Sergei Kirienko about its determination to hike tax revenues cannot conceal the fact that such a campaign will eat into its already slender base of support among the country's political and economic elites. In recent weeks,... MORE

Rivalry between Russia's Communist Party (KPRF) and the country's biggest trade union organization, the Federation of Independent Trade Unions (FITU), burst into the open this week as both organizations tried to assert their leadership of the industrial unrest sweeping the country. Leaders of both organizations... MORE

A top Russian General Staff officer said yesterday that Russia and China had agreed to step up joint efforts in military-technical research and arms development work, as well as in the designing of certain weapons systems. Without providing details, Colonel General Valery Manilov suggested that... MORE

According to the latest statistics published by Kazakhstan's National Statistics Agency (NSA), emigration from the republic by non-Kazakhs is continuing, though at a slightly reduced rate. Figures for the first quarter of 1998 show 44,000 people leaving the country and 9,000 moving into it. These... MORE

Turkmen President Saparmurat Niazov has offered the French company Bouygues, one of the West's leading construction firms, the role of modernizing Turkmenistan's capital Ashgabat. Niazov discussed on August 7 with Bouygues executives a comprehensive development plan for Ashgabat through the year 2020. Bouygues has already... MORE

With 122 votes in favor and two opposed, the Georgian parliament approved the nomination of Vazha Lortkipanidze as state minister (approximate equivalent of a prime minister) on August 7. Most of the opposition declined to vote. This appointment is the first step in President Eduard... MORE

During the night of August 8-9, three Abkhaz militiamen crossed the demarcation line and attacked a Georgian police post in Zugdidi district. They were killed in the ensuing firefight. The clash occurred in the security zone patrolled by Russian troops. (Radio Tbilisi, August 9) The... MORE