Over the past few years, the Azeri economy has ranked among the most dynamic in the CIS, growing by 11.4 percent in 2000 and 9.1 percent year-on-year in January-July. That growth has been achieved mainly due to the oil industry. During the first four months... MORE

Less than a month after they celebrated their annual holiday in traditionally raucous fashion, Russia's elite airborne forces face a future made uncertain by both the Kremlin's military restructuring plans and what some Russian sources report is backroom political maneuvering against the paratroopers within the... MORE

Incumbent Governor Boris Govorin was reelected in a runoff ballot in eastern Siberia's Irkutsk Oblast on August 19. With 47.6 percent of the votes cast, Govorin narrowly defeated Sergei Levchenko, a State Duma deputy and member of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (KPRF),... MORE

The Kremlin last week made some changes in the way the country's armed forces are organized at the regional level. As of August 22, the Volga military district ceased to exist as a separate military-territorial division and was merged with the Urals military district to... MORE

Like many post-Soviet economies, Kyrgyzstan has had difficulty ensuring an adequate tax take. This has been due partly to shortfalls in the amount of tax paid on legitimate economic activity, a reflection of under-reported earnings by businesses. It has also been due to the existence... MORE

Recently released data on first-half budget results for Kazakhstan show a consolidated budget surplus (central and local budgets) of 87.3 billion tenge in the first five months of this year. A conservative budget forecast of 4.0 percent GDP growth in 2001 and average inflation of... MORE

Hopes of a possible Russian-U.S. missile defense agreement, raised by a pair of friendly summit meetings between the Russian and U.S. presidents earlier this summer, have been left largely frustrated in the wake of an at-times tense series of talks between high-ranking officials from the... MORE

Fresh details of President Vladimir Putin's alleged criminal links dating back to his period of service in St. Petersburg's city administration have come to light in the most recent issue of Newsweek. The charges involve a German company called the St. Petersburg Real Estate Holding... MORE

The current Newsweek story essentially moves forward reports that first appeared last year in the French daily Le Monde and the Russian tabloid Sovershenno Sekretno. However, Le Monde--unlike Newsweek in its current article--claimed in its May 2000 item that German Gref, Russia's minister of economic... MORE

In recent weeks, Russia has pushed forward with several important economic reforms, establishing a unified price-setting agency and passing legislation to protect minority shareholders and simplify the registration of new businesses. After several months of preparations, the government announced plans to create a Unified Tariff... MORE