Mikhail Babich, the former Russian ambassador to Belarus, has been put in charge of integration efforts covering the entire Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The Kremlin had to pull Babich out of Minsk at the end of April because he had so offended President Alyaksandr... MORE

The 23rd St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, which convened on June 6–8, was, as every year, pronounced a huge success by the Russian authoriti­es. Certainly, the 19,000 participants from 145 countries and the 3.1 trillion rubles’ ($49 billion) worth of contracts announced marked new records... MORE

Fyodor Lukyanov, Russia’s premier political commentator and the chair of the Council for Foreign and Defense Policy, recently wrote an article titled, “Former [Soviet] Union Republics Enter New Development Phase. And Russia Is Touched by This Process, Too” (Global Affairs, June 13). In the piece,... MORE

For most of the Soviet period after 1945, Russians informally viewed Mongolia as “the 16th Soviet republic” not only because it tried to become one during World War II, but also because, even more than Bulgaria, it slavishly copied Soviet laws and practices. Notably, Mongolia... MORE

Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev was inaugurated as the second president of post-Soviet Kazakhstan, on June 12, following his confident victory a few days before. Though the results were as unsurprising as in all previous votes, the 2019 presidential election was unmistakably remarkable in one respect: having stepped... MORE

To buttress the country’s flagging economy, Moscow has counted on the Russian Federation being the primary transit route for Chinese goods being shipped to Europe. However, Beijing’s commitment to becoming the dominant player on the Northern Sea Route (The Barents Observer, June 7) as well... MORE

Tajikistan’s military, according to Moscow-based defense analyst Vladimir Mukhin, “today represents a small outpost of the Russian Army. It is completely equipped with Russian arms, has the same organizational structure,” its soldiers and officers are being trained by Russians and in Russian military schools, and... MORE

Serbia is preparing to sign a free trade agreement with the Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) in October, hoping to gain access to a market of 180 million people. At the same time, the Western Balkan country’s accession negotiations with the world’s largest trading bloc,... MORE

The second Central Asian Leaders’ Consultative Working Meeting was supposed to take place this spring, in Tashkent. However, scheduling conflicts around the Navruz holiday (March 20, 2019) prevented the summit from convening. For a time, there were indications that the summit would simply be rescheduled... MORE

A recent Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) report entitled, “The Composition of Crimes in Russia for January to March 2019” revealed that the number of crimes committed against foreigners and stateless persons has increased 9 percent year-on-year. Simultaneously, the number of crimes committed in... MORE