Taking ownership of and “conquering” the Arctic are themes Russian authorities love to amplify. But sometimes, the harsh Northern reality interferes. The crash of an Mi-8 helicopter in Svalbard (Spitsbergen), last Thursday (October 26), with eight lives lost, was one such occasion. Norway launched a... MORE

In 1953, subscribers to the third edition of the Bolshaya Sovetskaya Entsiklopedia were told to cut out the pages in one of its volumes devoted to a biography of the by-then-disgraced Lavrenty Beria, Joseph Stalin’s last secret police chief, and replace them with an article... MORE

On June 14, during the first international Global Cybersecurity Summit, in Kyiv, the secretary of the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council, Oleksandr Turchynov, stated that “Ukraine has become a playground for the testing of the most up-to-date cyber techniques” by the Russian Federation (Ukrinform.ru,... MORE

The strategically placed Gotland is the largest island in the Baltic Sea, with an area of 3,183.7 square kilometers—that is, slightly smaller than California’s Sacramento county. The island is situated 330 km from the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad Oblast and 110 km from the Swedish... MORE

As the Baltic States continue to confront Russian air and naval power in the Baltic Sea, two small missile ships, the Zelenyy Dol and the Serpukhov entered this crowded body of water at the end of October. These Russian vessels will reportedly become part of... MORE

The following political landscape piece is a part of Eurasia Daily Monitor’s special quarterly series of strategic assessments of developments across Eurasia. These pieces examine recent important developments and trends in the region, particularly since this past summer, and anticipate where those trend lines may... MORE

As the global economy continues its slow recovery from the 2008–2009 worldwide recession, armament sales appear to have been one of the few recession-proof export sectors. The greater Middle East has been main emporium for such purchases. While the United States and Russia remain the world’s... MORE

Last week (July 1), during a visit to Helsinki, Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened that Finland’s security would be undermined if the Nordic country decided to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Speaking at a joint press conference with his Finnish counterpart Sauli Niinistö,... MORE

In mid-June, the European Union pledged to provide one million euros ($1.13 million) to finance a preliminary study on the feasibility of constructing a railway tunnel between Tallinn and Helsinki, under the Gulf of Finland (ERR, June 15). The decision has attracted widespread attention to... MORE

By August 2015, at least 70 individuals from Finland had travelled to Syria and Iraq (Suomen Uutiset, July 30). [1] According to an Interior Ministry report from August 2014, the vast majority intended to join “radical opposition groups” operating in the conflict zone. [2] The... MORE