Lithuanian parliament chairman Vytautas Landsbergis yesterday strongly criticized State Security Department (SSD) chief Jurgis Jurgelis for his recent assertion that the secret services of hostile powers are not active in Lithuania. Equally "naive" was Jurgelis' public announcement last week that the SSD is "secretly preparing"... MORE

Ukrainian Prime Minister Valeriy Pustovoytenko told a Moscow press conference on September 16 that President Boris Yeltsin and Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin have ordered the Russian government to "re-examine" the 25 percent duty levied against Ukrainian sugar imports, as well as the 10 percent value-added... MORE

The Patriarch of Moscow and all Russia, Aleksy II, arrived yesterday in Ukraine's city of Odessa and attacked the Kyiv Patriarchy as "schismatic." "There can be no reconciliation except in the bosom of the one legitimate Orthodox Church," Aleksy said in a follow-up statement. He... MORE

Russia's 2000 presidential election began this weekend with an announcement by liberal economist Grigory Yavlinsky that he will be a candidate. Yavlinsky dismissed the predictions of Gen. Lev Rokhlin that presidential elections will be held earlier than 2000. He said that President Boris Yeltsin is... MORE

The Russian Duma last week adopted a new draft of the controversial law on freedom of conscience and religious association that President Yeltsin vetoed when it was first adopted in July. (Itar-Tass, AP, September 19) The new draft was agreed upon in August by a... MORE

U.S. vice president Al Gore arrived in Moscow yesterday for three days of talks expected to center on trade and economic issues, as well as on cooperation in space and nuclear non-proliferation. He is accompanied by a high-level U.S. delegation that includes several cabinet members.... MORE

During a meeting yesterday with U.S. energy secretary Federico Pena, Russian atomic energy minister Viktor Mikhailov proposed that the U.S. join Russia in monitoring Iran's controversial Bushehr nuclear power plant. The U.S. has opposed the $800 million deal under which Russia will complete the plant... MORE

Work will start this week on rebuilding the Chechen section of the Baku-Grozny-Novorossiisk oil pipeline, Russian first deputy prime minister Boris Nemtsov told a TV interviewer last week. (NTV, September i9) He said the work will cost between $2 and $2.5 billion. Plans are also... MORE

Police in both Chechnya and Ingushetia have denied knowledge of the whereabouts of two American missionaries, said to have been seized by gunmen over the weekend in Ingushetia, close to the border with Chechnya. The two, Dmitry Penskovsky and Dmitry Petrov, were working for the... MORE

Beijing has refused Grozny's proposal to exchange official envoys. A Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman revealed last week that an approach was made to the Chinese government by Chechnya's mission in Almaty through the Chinese Embassy in Kazakhstan. The Chinese government refused the invitation, informing the... MORE