*To read Part One, please click here. According to Kremlin-connected analyst Fedor Lukyanov, the Joseph Biden administration had to work hard with Moscow to make Under Secretary Victoria Nuland’s visit possible. The United States seeks a mutually accepted modus vivendi with Russia regarding the Donbas... MORE

The Joseph Biden administration has apparently decided to work with Russia toward a political solution to the conflict in Ukraine’s Donbas. On October 13, US Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland capped a three-day visit in Moscow (see EDM, October 14), conferring with Dmitry Kozak,... MORE

The Kremlin has published an open letter to and about Ukraine, replete with insults and threats. An official public document in such a style seemed inconceivable in contemporary international relations, but the Kremlin has turned the inconceivable into fact with this letter. Published in the... MORE

The Kremlin is skillfully exploiting a European energy crisis caused in part by flawed European policies. On October 6, at the TTF Hub in the Netherlands, the price of natural gas rose to an all-time European record of $1,936 per 1,000 cubic meters. Due to... MORE

Today (September 30) marks the final day in the captive life of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s Observer Mission (OSCE OM), which has operated on the Russian side of the Russia-Ukraine border, opposite Ukraine’s Donbas. Russia vetoed a prolongation of the Observer... MORE

On September 17–19, elections to Russia’s State Duma (lower house of parliament) were unlawfully staged in the Russian-occupied territories in Ukraine’s east (Donetsk and Luhansk) as well as in annexed Crimea. Elections to the Russian Duma were also held unlawfully in Transnistria, Abkhazia and South... MORE

On September 17–19, elections to Russia’s State Duma (lower house of Parliament) were unlawfully staged in Transnistria, Abkhazia and South Ossetia—territories seized from Moldova and Georgia, respectively. Russia also unlawfully staged elections to its Duma in the occupied territories in Ukraine’s Donbas (Donetsk and Luhansk)... MORE

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is reverting to his earlier, forlorn hopes of improving relation with Russia through a personal meeting with President Vladimir Putin. The Ukrainian president is eager to meet Putin “any time, any place”—whether bilaterally or in the framework of a “Normandy” summit... MORE

*To read Part One, please click here. The Joint Statement on the US-Ukraine Strategic Partnership was released during President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s Washington visit (Whitehouse.gov, President.gov.ua, September 1), but surprisingly it carries no signatures. This document’s two direct predecessors, in 2008 and 2018, respectively, had been... MORE

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s visit to the United States (August 31–September 2) succeeded, at least, in halting the degradation of the bilateral relationship, under way since 2019, particularly after the advent of the Joseph Biden administration. The White House’s temptation of a neo-reset with Russia... MORE