Russians are angry at the expanded presence of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) ships in the Black Sea and especially in Ukrainian ports, viewing them as a challenge to Russian power and influence there. Some in Moscow and especially in Russian-occupied Crimea are even concerned... MORE

The presidential elections in Ukraine last Sunday (March 31) were derided, denigrated and ridiculed by Russian propaganda, but they still marked a striking contrast with the severely controlled politics in Russia. In an odd historical coincidence, the last meaningful and even fateful elections Russia saw... MORE

On March 24, the United National Movement (UNM), Georgia’s former ruling party, held a party congress at which it approved Grigol Vashadze as its new chairperson (Civil.ge March 25). This does not mean, however, that UNM removed former Georgian president Mikhail Saakashvili, who founded the party... MORE

In March, the Mardzhani Institute of History, at the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Tatarstan, launched work on a five-volume edition covering the history of Crimean Tatars. According to the project, its realization “should contribute to objective coverage of the Crimean Tatars’ history within... MORE

On March 16, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko signed a decree on the “Reformation of the Defense Industrial Complex” (President.gov.ua, March 16). The document could have major implications for the development of Ukraine’s Armed Forces. The decree was initially approved on March 6, at a session... MORE

In the last several years, the Russian military has drastically increased its battle readiness in apparent preparation for a possible major conflict with an opposing massive ground force (see EDM, September 29, 2016; December 6, 2017; January 15, 2019). The massive buildup was first publicly... MORE

On November 26, a day after Russia attacked three small Ukrainian naval vessels attempting to pass through the Kerch Strait, German Chancellor Angela Merkel received official notification about this incident from Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko. In addition to sharing with Merkel the details of the... MORE

Cossacks in Ukraine and Russia are not the unquestioning soldiers of empire and repression that Moscow, Hollywood and the Western media routinely portray them as being. Certainly, some of the neo-Cossacks that President Vladimir Putin has created to more or less surreptitiously carry out the... MORE

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko met with defense-industry engineers and designers in Zhytomyr, on March 11, and stressed that Ukraine “needs high-precision missile weapons capable of striking targets far into the rear of the enemy” (President.gov.ua, March 11). In fact, however, the Ukrainian military has been... MORE

By mid-March 2014, Russian “little green men” took full control of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula. And on March 18, President Vladimir Putin made a jubilant address to the Russian Federation Council (upper chamber of parliament) on the “reunification” with Crimea, asserting, “In people’s hearts and minds,... MORE