Estonian Foreign Minister ToomasIlves told his parliament yesterday that their country "has done everythingshe could do" to sign the border agreement with Russia. The issue is nolonger a high priority for Estonia at this time, Ilves said, since thestalemate does not obstruct Estonia's accession talks... MORE

The Ukrainian miners' strike drags on withoutcatching real fire, but nevertheless providing the parliamentary left withammunition against the government. Out of Ukraine's approximately 270 mines,only some forty are striking--a number that remains constant since thestrike began on May 4. A touch of drama was added... MORE

The prototype of the AN-140plane was demonstrated in flight yesterday at the Kharkiv aviation plant.Representatives of airlines from Russia and several CIS countries attendedthis first public presentation of the plane. A follow-up presentation is dueshortly in the Russian city of Samara, whose aviation plant is... MORE

IlhanAliev, first vice president of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR)and son of President Haidar Aliev, has warned that SOCAR may resort tointernational arbitration to resolve differences with the AzerbaijanInternational Operating Company (AIOC). Ilhan Aliev issued this warning intwo press interviews in recent days.... MORE

Russian-mediated talksin Moscow between Georgian and Abkhaz representatives broke up yesterdayafter eleven days of nonstop negotiations. Visits to Moscow by GeorgianForeign Minister Irakly Menagarishvili on June 7 and June 10 for talks withhis counterpart Yevgeny Primakov failed to produce a moderating Russianinfluence on the Abkhaz... MORE

Kyrgyz security services have arrestedfour so-called "Wahhabi extremists" on suspicion of involvement in twoexplosions in the city of Osh. The explosions, on May 30 and 31, killed fourand wounded eleven. Kyrgyzstan's Internal Affairs Ministry had investigatedthe incidents and determined that that they had no political... MORE

If Uzbek state television canbe any guide to the situation in Namangan region, it seems that localresidents are clamoring for the closure of mosques. "People in the regionare concluding that too many mosques have been built" [since the end of theSoviet period] "and are asking... MORE

The June 8 arrest of Yuri Yurkov, the head of the State Statistics Committee (Goskomstat), and several other agency employees has disturbing implications for the viability of the tax crackdown which was announced last week by Boris Fedorov, the newly appointed head of the State... MORE

The president of the Russian Exchange, Aleksei Vlasov, and the former vice president of the exchange, Aleksander Deduchenko, have gone missing. Trading on the exchange was suspended in the midst of the financial crisis on June 1. A commission of creditors is meeting to discuss... MORE

The chances for early ratification of the START II treaty by Russia's parliament lessened considerably yesterday as lawmakers voted to postpone parliamentary hearings on the treaty from June 16 until sometime this fall. The vote was the latest skirmish in what has developed into a... MORE