The Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and the Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem have flown to Moscow on the same plane this week to meet their Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, to discuss the situation in Syria and the Geneva II peace conference due later... MORE

Ending Dagestan’s convoluted clan system is widely cited as the reason why Moscow dispatched Ramazan Abdulatipov to rule this large and violence-ridden North Caucasian republic one year ago. Over time, however, observers started noticing that Abdulatipov himself was gradually building his own clan as his... MORE

When the Soviet Union disintegrated, many in Europe and the United States talked about building an updated version of the Great Silk Road to link China with Europe via the countries of Central Asia and the Caucasus and to help redirect the focus of these... MORE

Following the meeting of the Russian Ministry of Defense collegium in Moscow on December 10, 2013, the defense minister, Army-General Sergei Shoigu, and the chief of the General Staff, Army-General Valery Gerasimov, instructed the top brass on the priorities facing the military. In their addresses... MORE

The year 2013 was particularly important for energy security in the Balkans, as it brought the news that Caspian natural gas is closer than ever to reaching a region that has been heavily dependent on Russian sources. At the same time, the Russian-led South Stream... MORE

On January 8, Russian authorities introduced a counter-terrorist operation regime in two southern districts of the Stavropol region. The move was in response to earlier incidents, in which police found four cars with five slain people in them (https://ria.ru/defense_safety/20140108/988277304.html). The number of people found murdered... MORE

The pre-planned introduction of an extra-tough security regime around Sochi last Tuesday (January 7) has brought an escalation of concerns about safety at the 22nd Winter Olympic Games, which will open in this sub-tropical resort on February 7. While Russian mainstream media sticks to the... MORE

The last week of 2013 was dominated by the news about three terrorist attacks—one in Pyatigorsk and two in Volgograd. These attacks overshadowed the tense situation in the North Caucasus itself.The last week of the year was the same as many previous ones and apparently... MORE

The previous year, which ended so tragically for Russia with terrorist attacks in Pyatigorsk and Volgograd, was not an exceptional one for a country that has been mired in terrorism-related violence since the start of the second Russian-Chechen war in the fall of 1999.The terrorist... MORE

Two terrorist suicide bomb explosions in Volgograd (former Stalingrad)—on December 29 in the main city railroad station, and on December 30 on a packed city trolleybus—killed 34 people and injured more than 60. Russian officials believe the attacks were perpetrated by North Caucasian–based Salafi jihadist... MORE