On January 18, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas submitted to his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, in Moscow a freshened-up German proposal for Russia to “ensure” unimpeded shipping through the Kerch Strait. In that case, a German-French group would monitor the traffic to certify that it... MORE

Nikolai Statkevich, a leader of the opposition Belarusian National Congress, warned in late December 2018 that, if Moscow sends troops into Belarus in an effort to annex it, Belarusians would resist and ensure that their country would not be “a second Crimea” but rather “a... MORE

The main political theme in Georgia in recent days has been the position of the Georgian Orthodox Church (GOC) regarding the recognition of the autocephaly of the Ukrainian Church. On December 27, the Georgian Patriarchate declared that the Holy Synod—the main decision-making body of the... MORE

Over the past several months, Belarus has found itself in yet another conflict-in-progress with Russia. As always, it started with a cascade of economic issues, primarily centered on Russia’s so-called oil “tax maneuver” and the financial losses it will incur on Belarus (see EDM, October... MORE

In just the month of December 2018, Presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia and Alyaksandr Lukashenka of Belarus met three times: in St. Petersburg on the 6th (see EDM, December 12, 2018) and in Moscow on the 25th and 29th. On the two last occasions, they... MORE

On February 24, 2019, Moldova will elect a new parliament based on a mixed electoral system adopted in July 2017 by the incumbent Democratic Party, led by oligarch Vladimir Plahotniuc, and the nominally opposition Party of Socialists, controlled by President Igor Dodon. The new system... MORE

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev traveled to Belarus on November 19 (see EDM, December 6). During his visit, both governments signed a number of key agreements, including regarding the supply of Belarusian air-defense weapons to Azerbaijan. President Aliyev praised the level of “military-technical cooperation” with Belarus,... MORE

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has offered a sanitized account of the failed “Normandy” meeting (Russia, Ukraine, Germany, France) that discussed the crisis in the Azov Sea and Kerch Strait. The meeting was held in Berlin on December 11 in almost complete secrecy (see accompanying article),... MORE

Russia has rejected the German government’s proposal to deploy monitors of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to the Azov Sea and Kerch Strait. The mission would have been tasked with monitoring shipping in those two bodies of water and report on... MORE

Russia’s relations with the West steadily worsened throughout 2018, and hopes that the presumed positive chemistry between United States President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, might help find some way to reverse this trend never materialized. The long-awaited full-scale Trump-Putin summit in... MORE