Russian authorities are apparently determined to come down hard on naval officers who reveal details of the environmental problems associated with the country's aging fleet of nuclear-powered submarines. The most prominent victim of this policy has been retired captain Aleksandr Nikitin, who spent ten months... MORE

Downward pressure on the hryvnya has led the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) to clamp down on the foreign exchange market and to raise interest rates sharply. While these developments are linked to the general instability currently afflicting international capital markets, they could exact a... MORE

Chechen leaders have responded cautiously to last week's announcement by President Boris Yeltsin that he plans to visit Grozny in January. Security Council secretary Ivan Rybkin is to go to the breakaway republic tomorrow or the next day to begin preparations for the visit. A... MORE

After a brief informal meeting yesterday near Moscow, Russian president Boris Yeltsin and visiting German chancellor Helmut Kohl announced that the first in a series of German-French-Russian summits will be held in the first half of next year. The announcement builds on a proposal made... MORE

Amid increasing concern that the turmoil afflicting emerging markets worldwide may undermine the Russian economy, two senior Russian officials traveled to Washington last week for talks with U.S. Treasury, IMF, and World Bank officials about ways of supporting the ruble should it come under increased... MORE

The Russian president made it clear on November 29 that Anatoly Chubais will remain a First Deputy Premier. Yeltsin said he does not see a successor to this post "for the moment." Yeltsin's statement appeared designed to reassure the international financial community, which is alarmed... MORE

The latest version of Russia's MiG-29 jet fighter made its maiden flight on November 29. Named the MiG-29-917, the plane is said to have improved cockpit instruments, longer range, and a radar more capable than its predecessors. (Russian and Western media, November 29) Yeltsin Resurrecting... MORE

Russian president Boris Yeltsin's foreign policy adviser Sergei Prikhodko announced today that Yeltsin will soon "clarify" and "detail" his offer of Russian security guarantees to Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Those three countries rejected Yeltsin's plan last month because it would have required them to renounce... MORE

The Russian government won a reprieve yesterday, when President Boris Yeltsin gave Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin an additional week in which to prepare a report on the government's work. Last week, Yeltsin announced that he was ordering the government to give him an account of... MORE

On November 18, at Kazakhstan's Independent Press Club the former head of the National Securities Commission, Grigory Marchenko, was asked by journalists to provide an update on the latest developments in the stock exchange and on his own future plans. Although he had received the... MORE