On July 23, Russia's ORT television asserted that numerous militants of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), purportedly commanded by Juma Namangani, were gathering on the Tajik side of the Tajik-Kyrgyz border, ready to attack Kyrgyzstan at any moment. The state-controlled Russian network advanced that... MORE

In a move that could further complicate implementation of an already contentious plan by Russia's Atomic Energy Ministry (Minatom) to import thousands of tons of spent nuclear fuel from abroad, Turkish authorities have vowed in recent weeks to ensure that shipments of the nuclear waste... MORE

The meeting yesterday (July 26) of the Kremlin's Security Council did not, as some media had rumored, result in Kaliningrad Oblast being designated Russia's eighth federal district (see the Monitor, July 26). However, Viktor Cherkesov, President Vladimir Putin's representative to the North-West federal district, announced... MORE

President Vladimir Putin has apparently again ruled out negotiating with Chechen rebels. Anatoly Kvashnin, chief of the Russian armed forces' General Staff, told NTV television yesterday that he met with Putin on July 24 and told the president that there were rumors that such negotiations... MORE

Work creating electoral alliances for Ukraine's parliamentary elections of March 2002 is now in full swing. On June 17, the leaders of four major pro-presidential parties--Serhy Tyhypko of Labor Ukraine, Mykola Azarov of the Ukrainian Party of Regions (UPR), Valery Pustovoytenko of the People's Democratic... MORE

Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma has authorized the dismissal of Crimean Premier Serhy Kunitsyn, who was voted out of the office by Crimean legislature on July 18. Appointed in May 1998, Kunitsyn was the longest-serving head of the Crimean executive. Under him, the Crimea saw a... MORE

Russia's diplomacy in Asia took an intriguing turn this week when unnamed official sources in Moscow and a Russian customs service spokeswoman in Vladivostok were reported to have said that North Korean President Kim Jong-il is soon to be en route to Moscow. According to... MORE

President Vladimir Putin is presiding over a meeting of the Kremlin's Security Council today to discuss the fate of the Kaliningrad region. Specifically, the Security Council session will be devoted to discussing possible ways to "protect" the Russian enclave, which is wedged between Lithuania and... MORE

On July 23, an Iranian military plane and warship forced two Azerbaijani vessels to withdraw from a major offshore oilfield being developed by a Western consortium. The vessels, contracted by consortium operator British Petroleum (BP), were carrying out surveys preparatory to drilling at the Alov-Araz-Sharg... MORE

The July 23 incident, in which an Iranian warship forced an Azerbaijani research vessel out of a British-Azerbaijani offshore oil drilling area, is the most serious consequence thus far of a naval buildup otherwise spearheaded by Russia in the Caspian Sea. Notwithstanding the fact that... MORE