Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt and Foreign Affairs Minister Louis Michel of Belgium--the country currently chairing the European Union--as well as the EU Commission's President Romano Prodi and High Representative for Security and Defense Javier Solana met with President Leonid Kuchma and other Ukrainian leaders on... MORE

Like a host of other political leaders from around the globe, Russian President Vladimir Putin used harsh language yesterday to condemn the deadly terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon building in Washington. In a telegram to President George... MORE

Like the rest of the world, Russia has been reacting to yesterday's terrorist attacks in New York and Washington. In a telegram to President George W. Bush, President Vladimir Putin asked the U.S president to pass on Russia's "deepest sympathies" to the relatives of the... MORE

Khachig Poghossian, head of the Oversight Committee attached to the Armenian prime minister's office, was assassinated on September 11 by a grenade blast at the entrance to his Yerevan apartment. The technique used is novel even for the seasoned local killers: The grenade had been... MORE

On Tajikistan's National Day, September 8, unidentified gunmen assassinated Culture Minister Abdurahim Rahimov with five pistol shots outside his Dushanbe apartment. President Imomali Rahmonov blamed "enemies of the Tajik people," but stopped short of suggesting a real motive. The post of culture minister is highly... MORE

A politically tinged scandal involving the media has been unfolding in Lipetsk Oblast over the last several weeks. At the center of the scandal is a local television channel, TVK, whose offices and studios were taken over late last month on the order of several... MORE

The authorities in Moscow have made their own attempt to resolve the problem of providing alternative service to those who refuse to be drafted into Russia's armed forces. Vladimir Pronin, who was recently named head of the Interior Ministry's Moscow branch--in essence, Moscow's police chief--has... MORE

On September 3, Ukraine's parliament (Verkhovna Rada) received Prosecutor General Mykhaylo Potebenko's official request for permission to arrest former Premier Pavlo Lazarenko. This time around the charges involve Lazarenko's involvement in two high-profile murders: of former National Bank of Ukraine chairman Vadym Hetman in 1998,... MORE

Ukraine's charismatic former Premier Viktor Yushchenko, dismissed in April by a coalition of Communists and oligarchs in the Verkhovna Rada, remains one of the country's most popular politicians. His popular approval ratings have not dropped below 20 percent, far higher than any other Ukrainian political... MORE

On the occasion of Uzbekistan's tenth anniversary and in its aftermath, various groups of the political opposition have made themselves heard. Their respective messages differ from each other in crucial ways. The underground movement Hezb-e Tahrir [Islamic Party of Liberation] issued a manifesto challenging not... MORE