President Nursultan Nazarbaev has named Kazakh first deputy prime minister Ahmetzhan Yesimov to serve as acting prime minister during the illness of the office's incumbent, Akezhan Kazhegeldyn. On September 22, Kazhegeldyn departed for an unspecified European country for treatment of phlebitis, following treatment at the... MORE

A spokesman announced on September 19 that Russian foreign minister Yevgeny Primakov will soon pay an official visit to the Middle East. No specific dates were given. The announcement followed talks in Moscow between Primakov and a top Palestinian official. (Russian agencies, September 19) In... MORE

Russia's Defense Ministry announced last week that 84 servicemen had AIDS. Of this total, 27 were officers or warrant officers and 55 were regular conscripts. Two contract soldiers had the disease. Nearly one-half (41) had served in Kaliningrad, where they were said to have been... MORE

Returning from official visits to France and Italy, President Petru Lucinschi told a news conference yesterday that Moldova is counting on those countries' support in its "long march to Europe." Moldova seeks both to enter Europe and to become an East-West link owing to its... MORE

Defense Minister Vardiko Nadibaidze announced yesterday that Tbilisi is discussing with Washington and NATO the possibility of conducting joint military exercises in Georgia. In its effort to create national armed forces, Georgia needs to cooperate both with NATO and with Russia, Nadibaidze said. But he... MORE

The Military Board of the Supreme Court of Azerbaijan yesterday sentenced warrant officer Tengiz Suleimanov to 12 years of hard labor on charges of spying for a foreign power. Earlier this year, Azerbaijan's presidential security service caught Suleimanov in the act of handing secret military... MORE

President Boris Yeltsin yesterday summoned Interior Minister Anatoly Kulikov to the Kremlin and hauled him over the coals for media reports alleging that the Urals town of Leninsk-Kuznetsk, in the heart of Russia's Kuzbass coal-mining region, has been taken over by a criminal gang. (NTV,... MORE

U.S. vice president Al Gore suggested yesterday that Russia and the U.S. had made some progress on issues related to arms control and export of technologies to Iran, but the two sides apparently clashed over a Russian draft law on religion. Gore's comments followed a... MORE

The result of talks in New York between Russian foreign minister Yevgeny Primakov and U.S. president Bill Clinton offered a similarly mixed picture. According to U.S. officials, Primakov told Clinton that Moscow would not oppose parliamentary elections set for next month by Bosnian Serb president... MORE

Workers from more than 30 defense plants across Russia began picketing government buildings in Moscow yesterday to draw attention to the dire financial straits faced by the country's military-industrial complex. The protest is scheduled to last for five days and there are similar actions planned... MORE