As expected, the U.S. Senate voted overwhelmingly on May 22 to approve legislation imposing sanctions on companies or other organizations found to be exporting missile technology to Iran. The Senate vote, which came despite the opposition of the Clinton administration, is clearly aimed at Russia.... MORE

Not surprisingly, the Senate vote elicited a critical response from Moscow. On May 25, a Russian Foreign Ministry official accused U.S. lawmakers--and the U.S. media--of falsely citing missile proliferation concerns to "prevent the free development of legitimate trade and economic ties" between Russia and Iran.... MORE

Despite a hint last week that Russian ratification of the START II treaty might be back on track, Russian Foreign Ministry Yevgeny Primakov suggested in a Washington Post interview published over the weekend that such thinking might be overly optimistic. "The prospects of ratification are... MORE

While Defense Ministry officials proudly demonstrated Russia's newest attack helicopters last week to visiting Turkish General Staff chief Ismail Karaday, they also cautioned that Turkey, as a NATO member, would likely lean toward NATO models when buying new arms. They also noted that any major... MORE

Yuri Boldyrev, deputy head of the Accounting Chamber, presented an incisive but gloomy analysis of the state of Russian democracy to a conference at Oslo University on May 14. Boldyrev, a St. Petersburg-based politician, was one of the founders of Yabloko but subsequently left the... MORE

On May 22, Lithuania commemorated fifty years since the "Great Deportation," when more than 40,000 Lithuanians were deported to Russia's Siberian and Arctic regions. Overall, more than 300,000 Lithuanians were deported there from 1941 to 1953. Addressing a solemn session of the parliament, President Valdas... MORE

Presidents Leonid Kuchma of Ukraine and Valdas Adamkus of Lithuania joined their Polish counterpart Aleksander Kwasniewski in Rzezow (southern Poland) on May 25 for a meeting of their countries' Economic Forum. Large groups of businessmen accompanied the governmental delegations. The economic talks focused on encouraging... MORE

Presidents Leonid Kuchma of Ukraine and Suleyman Demirel of Turkey ascertained their countries' common interests in the Black Sea region during Demirel's official visit to Ukraine from May 21 to 23. (See story in Russian Federation section.) The presidents came out in favor of Ukraine's... MORE

Fighting continued during the weekend and yesterday between Abkhaz forces and Georgian guerrillas in Gali district. Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze informed the country on radio yesterday that some 30,000 Georgian civilians, from among those who had filtered back to Gali district, were forced to flee... MORE

Addressing parliament on May 19, the head of the health committee in the Ministry of Education, Culture and Health, Vasily Devyatko, asserted that "the Republic [of Kazakhstan] is facing a demographic crisis." (Panorama [Almaty], MAY 22) Since 1991, Kazakhstan's population has fallen from 16.8 million... MORE