The Fight for Access to Yeltsin By Andrei Zhukov The recent personnel reshuffles at the top have led to the formationof a fundamentally new balance of political forces in the president'sentourage. By all indications, the president continues to employhis favorite tactic of "divide and rule,"... MORE

Central Asia Enters the Muslim World by Aleksei Malashenko The Islamic revival which began in the Soviet Union in the lastyears of perestroika, and continued even more energeticallyafter the collapse of the Soviet Union, was accompanied by a politicizationof Islam. Or, to be more precise,... MORE

Chechnya: Preparing for War Without End By Maria Eismont The war in Chechnya did not end on the eve of the Russian presidentialelections, it did not end after Boris Yeltsin's reelection, thereis no thought of it ending now, and it may never end at all,... MORE

A New Empire Under the Yellow and Blue Flag? By Vasily Andreev Everybody has heard about the Ukrainian nationalists, however,few know about them in any detail. Their past is shrouded in mythsand legends and nearly the same can be said about their present. "Nationalist" organizations... MORE

A New Approach to National Security By Aleksandr Vladimirov and Aleksandr Zhilin The collapse of the USSR and the disappearance of the Warsaw Pacthave forced Russia to look for new forms, structures, and approacheswhich would allow her to reliably guarantee her national security.But this search... MORE

The Surprising Vitality of the Russian Defense Industry By Stanislav Lunev The current state of the Russian military-industrial complex (VPK)is attracting the attention of a growing number of Russian politicians,all of whom express concern for the unfortunate condition of Russianmilitary industry, which, in a vivid... MORE

Tajikistan: Nostalgia for a Lost Past TAJIKISTAN AND RUSSIA'S PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION By Igor Rotar The Most Communist Republic Perhaps nowhere on the territory of the former USSR do so manypeople sympathize with the Communists as in Tajikistan. Eyes oftenfill with tears when people recall how... MORE

The Election in the Regions By Andrei Zhukov The results of the second round of the Russian presidential electionsare, perhaps, most interesting when viewed from the standpointof regional preferences because the future president will be dealing,not with each individual voter who voted for him, but... MORE

How Yeltsin Pulled it Off By Yelena Dikun When Boris Yeltsin officially announced last February that hewould participate in the presidential elections, political scientistsand pollsters took a rather dim view of his chances: they predictedthat he would get no more than ten percent of the... MORE

Can General Lebed Save Russia? By Sergei Oznobishchev Both Communist rule and democratic rule have proven to have seriousflaws in Russia. It took Communist rule 70 years to discredititself while, due to the activities of Boris Yeltsin and his entourage,five years has been enough for... MORE