By Zaal Anjaparidze [Editor's Note: Last fall Georgia fell into a political crisis triggered by economic failures against a background of separatist movements and Russian pressure. On November 1, 2001, President Eduard Shevardnadze dismissed his cabinet, and parliamentary chairman (speaker) Zurab Zhvania, once a Shevardnadze... MORE

By Vladimir Zviglyanich [Editor's Note: The Ukrainian parliament has gone on summer recess, leaving international and domestic observers confused. What really happened during the parliamentary election? Why did the winners lose power? What are the prospects for the opposition in the two years before the... MORE

By Vladimir Socor At a five-party meeting on July 2-3, ambassadors of Russia, Ukraine and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) officially submitted to Moldova and secessionist Transnistria a project to federalize Moldova, under joint mediation and guarantees by Moscow, Kyiv and... MORE

By Aleksandr Buzgalin Is Russia's economy expanding or contracting? The indicators point both ways. Today's apparent equilibrium is unstable, and the government, out of caution or fear, hesitates to act. While President Putin and others demand more ambitious targets than the government's 2002 growth projection... MORE

By Zaira Magomedova Dagestan's 72-year-old leader Magomedali Magomedov was overwhelmingly re-elected to his fourth term on June 25. After a decade of violent ethnic competition, Dagestan's elite and its public have worn themselves out and exhausted their resources for political struggle. The only force to... MORE

By Oleg Varfolomeyev After years of waffling between allegiance to Russia and the West, Ukraine has signaled its readiness to join NATO. Ukraine's Security Council secretary, Yevhen Marchuk, announced on May 23 that Ukraine would seek alliance membership. President Leonid Kuchma confirmed this. Achieving it... MORE

By Vladimir Socor June 2002 has marked a potentially decisive turn in the Great Game for Caspian oil--a game Washington has played for a draw at the very best, even as Moscow plays for the sweepstakes. On June 5, Presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia and... MORE

By Taras Kuzio On July 4, Copenhagen will host the next Ukraine-EU summit. The session is unlikely, however, to resolve poor relations between the two once and for all because there is fault on both sides. Next year, Poland--the last country on Ukraine's western border--will... MORE

By Andrei Kolganov [Note: This article is largely based on the findings of a Russia-wide sociological survey; "New Russia: Ten Years of Reform," carried out in November 2001 by the Institute of Complex Social Studies. That study used research conducted in 1992-2000 by the Russian... MORE

By Elena Chinyaeva Russian officials made a presentation last month to the Financial Action Task Force, a twenty-nine-nation agency the G-7 countries established in 1989 to combat money laundering. They hoped to persuade the FATF that recent reforms merit crossing Russia off the list of... MORE