By Elena Dikun The way Sergei Stepashin's government was formed has demonstrated that the country today is being run, openly and cynically, by a "family politburo," consisting of the president's daughter Tatyana Dyachenko, his former chief of staff Valentin Yumashev, his current chief of staff... MORE

SPECULATING ON RUSSIA'S POLITICAL FUTURE In Russia, the fortnight began amid frenzied speculation over President Boris Yeltsin's rumored plans either to remain in power after the June 2000 presidential vote or to find a successor who could guarantee a "continuity of power"--that is, the current... MORE

By Igor Rotar The first elections for the head of the north Caucasian republic of Karachai-Cherkessia almost erupted into civil war recently. As soon as rumors began circulating that the second round of voting on May 16 had resulted in a victory for the former... MORE

By Brian Whitmore Russia's regional leaders are cautiously maneuvering and organizing in an attempt to carve out their places in the country's political landscape when President Boris Yeltsin finally passes from the scene. Last month, in the hall where Russia's first elected parliament convened nearly... MORE

By Vladimir Mironov The events which took place during the last month of spring brought to an end two major political processes which had been underway in the Russian Federation for the last year and a half, and initiated a third. First, on May 12... MORE

By Yulia Latynina Last week an amazed Russian public got to watch an instructive spectacle. A united coalition of oligarchs which had just ousted Yevgeny Primakov and brilliantly overcome the impeachment crisis almost instantaneously began to fight over the division of the spoils. It was... MORE

RUSSIA'S NEW GOVERNMENT: MORE KREMLIN SHENANIGANS The dust has hardly settled from either the months-long battle to oust former Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov or the State Duma's attempt to impeach President Boris Yeltsin. Yet the victors in that first battle--the oligarchs who had been in... MORE

By Volodymyr Zviglyanich [Necromancy, (Greek, from nekros, a dead body, and manteia, divination), the art of divining the future by conjuring up the spirits of the dead and questioning them.] The only press Belarus gets is negative press. With the help of both Western and... MORE

By Elena Dikun On May 12 Russian President Boris Yeltsin fired Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov and appointed First Vice Premier Sergei Stepashin as acting head of government. Once again the head of state has brought the political situation in the country to a head: It... MORE

By Brian Whitmore An enigmatic figure, Russia's new prime minister has displayed various contradictory faces in his brief and meteoric political career. A tough-talking law enforcement officer, in the early 1990s Stepashin joined the budding pro-democracy movement in Leningrad--now St. Petersburg--eventually winning a seat in... MORE