The defense ministers of Germany, Denmark, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania -- the Baltic Sea countries that are members or aspiring members of NATO -- discussed at a meeting in Denmark joint measures to enhance regional security. Three major programs were mapped out, each of... MORE

Reports from Minsk suggest that economic conditions in Belarus are considerable less favorable than the official portrait of a booming recovery would suggest. Alyaksandr Bukhvostaw, a leader of the Independent Automobile and Agricultural Machine-Building Trade Union, was recently quoted in Belapan as saying that many... MORE

The secretary of Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council, Volodymyr Horbulin, said on May 10 that Ukraine could not agree to a U.S. proposal that it stop producing and testing short- and medium-range ballistic missiles. Many of the Soviet Union's missile production facilities were situated... MORE

Azerbaijani president Haidar Aliev completed on 9 May a five-day visit to Turkey that turned sour after the signing of a promising agreement on "strategic partnership". (See Monitor, May 7) In several statements in Ankara and Izmir, Aliev described Turkey's position on the Karabakh conflict... MORE

German chancellor Helmut Kohl, flying home from Southeast Asia, stopped over in Almaty yesterday for talks with Kazakstani president Nursultan Nazarbaev. The two leaders expressed satisfaction with the growth in bilateral trade, which reached $400 million in 1996, notwithstanding the fact that Germany is not... MORE

Russian Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov, meeting with Belarus president Aleksandr Lukashenko yesterday in Minsk, stated that the planned Russia-Belarus Union would "change the geopolitical situation in Europe" and, additionally, spur other "republics" of the former USSR into integration with Russia. In Moscow, the Duma's Communist... MORE

Russian president Boris Yeltsin fully supports Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov and is "bewildered by and indignant over some media reports... criticizing the Foreign Ministry and its leader," presidential spokesman Sergei Yastrzhembsky said yesterday. Yeltsin and Primakov met yesterday to discuss NATO enlargement, a topic on... MORE

Boris Yeltsin said yesterday that Russia's military reform program will be launched in practical terms following a meeting of the country's Defense Council later this month. (RIA, May 8) Yeltsin's remark comes one day after the Defense Ministry announced it is finalizing work on a... MORE

The Czech Finance Ministry on May 7 denied a report by the Russian newspaper Kommersant-daily alleging that Prague had agreed to accept $100 million worth of military hardware as partial repayment for Russia's debt to the Czech Republic. According to the ministry, Russia in fact... MORE

A Russian trade representative in Hungary said yesterday that Russia was ready to compete in the expected tender for a new Hungarian fighter -- joining a competition with U.S., French, and Swedish companies. The official said that Russia would propose to modernize 30 Hungarian MiG-21... MORE