According to the weekend issue of Vechernyi Bishkek, Kyrgyz police has beefed up patrols in the city of Osh and has set up cordons around the city. Osh is described as "tense" following the arrest of three residents on suspicion of having set off explosions... MORE

The IMF gave a cautious signalyesterday that, if Russia meets certain conditions, it may be willing toprovide additional funding to support the embattled ruble. The announcementwas expected to buoy Russian financial markets, which fell earlier in theweek when a widely anticipated international assistance package failed... MORE

More details of adecree signed by President Boris Yeltsin on June 10 have emerged. The billseeks to regulate access by Russia's regions to international bond markets.Preliminary reports evoked a furious reaction from regional governors led byMoscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov. (ORT, Itar-Tass, June 10; and see... MORE

Russia's Communist-dominated StateDuma launched a bid yesterday to rule out the possibility that Boris Yeltsinwill run for president again in 2000. The Duma voted by 309 votes with 1abstention to approve, in the first reading, a bill that would ban asecond-term president from registering as... MORE

Rosneft--the largest Russianoil company still in state ownership--will be fully privatized before theend of this year, the cash-strapped Russian government announced yesterday.That is, of course, only if the government can find a buyer willing to putup the US$1.6 billion it is asking for the block... MORE

Russia's already troubled armedforces endured yet another indignity on June 9, when the country's RailwaysMinistry warned that it would temporarily suspend shipments of militarycargoes as of June 15, if the armed forces do not pay off their debts to therailroads. The suspension of shipments would... MORE

In a move likely to strainrelations with Moscow, the NATO allies moved yesterday a big step closer tousing military force in order to halt escalating violence in Kosovo. At ameeting in Brussels of NATO defense ministers, the Alliance ordered militaryplanners to begin preparing a list... MORE

In Moscow yesterday, theRussian presidential press service announced that Yugoslav PresidentSlobodan Milosevic will travel to the Russian capital for talks withPresident Boris Yeltsin on June 15-16. During his recent trip to Bonn,Yeltsin was urged to exert influence on Serbian leaders in Belgrade, and theRussian president... MORE

Russian officials have indicatedin recent days that preparations are continuing for the delivery of S-300air-defense missile complexes to Cyprus. The commander of Russia's Air Forcesaid on June 10 that servicemen from Cyprus are soon to begin testing theS-300s at a Russian testing site near Astrakhan... MORE

Thekidnapping of six Ingush by Ossetians (see the Monitor, June 11) hasprovoked a crisis between the North Ossetian and Ingush presidents. For thefirst time, Ingush President Ruslan Aushev has made direct accusationsagainst North Ossetian President Aleksandr Dzasokhov: "All this[hostage-taking] was set in motion by certain... MORE