With Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s direct backing, Gazprom and other Russian energy companies have embarked upon an effort to co-opt Croatia into their projects, including a fanciful South Stream gas transport project. Putin has personally offered a package of energy projects to Croatia’s Prime Minister... MORE

Turkish President Abdullah Gul paid an official visit to France on October 7-9 to attend the celebrations as part of the Season of Turkey, which served as a venue to re-evaluate the current condition of Turkish-French relations, and induce a new degree of economic rationalism... MORE

On October 6 the French President Nicolas Sarkozy arrived in Astana on a state visit and met his counterpart Nursultan Nazarbayev. During his one day visit he also held talks with Kazakhstan’s Foreign Minister Kanat Saudabayev and the Minister of Economics and Budget Planning Bakhyt... MORE

Authorities in Tiraspol are watching the political deadlock in Chisinau with barely concealed satisfaction. Moldova’s political and constitutional crisis since April has further deepened the freeze on both tracks of negotiations on the Transnistria conflict: the international 5+2 format and the bilateral right bank –... MORE

Moldova's new government of the Alliance for European Integration (AEI) has inherited a deeply frozen negotiation process on the Transnistria conflict. Russia, a direct participant in the conflict, with troops in place, continues successfully to evade responsibility by portraying it as an internal Moldovan conflict... MORE

Nortima, a company linked to the Ukrainian tycoon Ihor Kolomoysky, on September 29 won the privatization tender for Odessa Portside Plant (OPZ), one of Ukraine’s largest chemical factories. Nortima bid over $625 million, more than its rivals: the Russian Sibur and Russian-Ukrainian businessman Konstantin Grigorishin.... MORE

The recent election in Greece resulted in a convincing victory for George Papandreou’s Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK). Despite the fact that Turkish-Greek relations were not a major issue during the election campaign, Ankara closely monitored the election. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu stated that Turkey... MORE

The Alliance for European Integration (AEI) has taken over much but not all power in Moldova from the Communist Party. The AEI is a heterogeneous combination of four political parties, each one with its own profile and its leadership ambitions, and in some cases competing... MORE

A new Moldovan government finally took office on September 25 and the new Prime Minister, Vlad Filat, undertook his first visit abroad in that capacity on September 29 to Brussels, reflecting this government`s top priority to advance relations with the European Union (Moldpres, September 29,... MORE

Germany’s federal elections passed without incident on September 27, though they took place against a backdrop of intense concern in the German security services about a growing number of increasingly pointed al-Qaeda videos threatening Germany over its military deployment in Afghanistan. These messages included a... MORE