President Yeltsin has appointed Farit Gazizullin as Deputy Prime Minister. He replaces Maksim Boiko, who was dismissed last month after it was revealed that he and other Russian government ministers had accepted large royalty payments from a company owned by Oneksimbank, whose interests they were... MORE

Although he condemned its Soviet-era abuses, Russian president Boris Yeltsin on December 19 used his regular weekly radio address (canceled the previous week because of his illness) to paint a mostly glowing picture of the country's post-KGB security and intelligence services. Yeltsin was speaking a... MORE

President Boris Yeltsin announced this morning that he intends to leave the sanitarium where he has been recovering from a "severe cold" and will return home tomorrow. On December 18, when Yeltsin announced his intention of going home the following day, his doctors advised him... MORE

Conflict continues to rage within the Russian government. Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin has vowed to get to the bottom of last week's leak to the media of letters sent to the government by IMF managing director Michel Camdessus and World Bank president James Wolfensohn. (NTV,... MORE

President Saparmurad Niazov on December 15 announced yet another series of personnel changes in the government and among regional office holders. Key appointments include Aleksandr Dadaev as Chairman of the Committee for Public Water Supply, Ata Nobadov as Agricultural Minister, Rovshan Kerkabov as Communications Minister,... MORE

Underscoring Akmola's inauguration as capital of Kazakhstan, Presidents Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan and Askar Akaev of Kyrgyzstan joined Nazarbaev there for a summit of the tripartite Central Asian Union. The presidents approved a plan to create consortiums of the three countries in water management and... MORE

The northern city of Akmola officially became the new capital of Kazakhstan on December 10, replacing Almaty in that role. Media reporting on the move has tended to focus on its logistical difficulties, the human hardships of relocating to an underdeveloped zone of harsh climate,... MORE

Kazakhstan's Independence Day, observed on December 16, prompted President Nursultan Nazarbaev to grope for a definition of the country's national and cultural identity. In several speeches on the occasion, Nazarbaev attempted to strike a balance that reflected the complexity of the issue. Decrying the suppression... MORE

Attending an extraordinary government meeting, President Guntis Ulmanis sharply criticized the cabinet of ministers, the parliament, and Latvia's political parties for neglecting the country's defense posture. Ulmanis pointed out that the 1997 military budget amounted to only 0.67 percent of GDP and that the same... MORE

The command of Georgia's border troops announced yesterday that Russian border troops had on December 17 moved their Upper Larsi post back to its original location in undisputed Russian territory. The post's forward relocation into territory that Georgia considers its own had recently sparked a... MORE