By "Sadji" Askar Akaev has been president of Kyrgyzstan for more than seven years. People still argue over whether his coming to power was an accident or the result of a logical process. Answering this question is very important, because without such an answer, any... MORE

This past fortnight was an eventful one, as Russia was shaken by a financial crisis and a miners strike, while maverick general-turned-politician Aleksandr Lebed emerged as an election victor. Moscow, meanwhile, won full membership in the Group of Eight. But that event was overshadowed by... MORE

Part 2: The Perm City Referendum on Dismantling Solid-Fuel Missiles

By Ilya Malyakin Stalin liquidated the Volga German Autonomous Republic [VGAR], which existed in the 1920s and 1930s in parts of what are now Volgograd and Saratov Oblasts, when the USSR entered World War II. The Volga Germans went onto the list of repressed peoples,... MORE

By Igor Rotar Georgia's ethnic Armenian population compactly resides in the Meskhet-Javakhetia region, which borders Armenia, predominantly on the Javakhetian side. Armenians make up more than 90 percent of the population in Javakhetia (the Akhalkalaki and Ninotsminda districts of Georgia). Georgian and Armenian historians have... MORE

By Oleg Varfolomeyev Many observers in Ukraine see Yevhen Marchuk, who spent over thirty years climbing up the career ladder in the security services and one year as prime minister, as President Leonid Kuchma's strongest rival in the presidential elections scheduled for the fall of... MORE

By Vera Tolz This is a condensed version of a paper presented at the annual conference of the British Association of Slavic and East European Studies. The paper will be published in its entirety in a forthcoming issue of Europe-Asia Studies. The collapse of the... MORE

Russia's new government assumed final shape under the leadership of Prime Minister Sergei Kirienko. The key players in the restructured cabinet were three deputy premiers, two of whom were holdovers from the previous government. First among equals was Boris Nemtsov, who regained oversight of energy... MORE

By Nikolai Petrov This article will run in a two-part series. Part 2 will follow in the next issue of Prism. Part 1: Moscow Oblast INTRODUCTION

By Emil Danielyan Hardly any other part of the former Communist bloc has seen such a dramatic economic decline as has the South Caucasus, in its transition to a market economy. The three republics of the region -- Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia -- have plunged... MORE