A police colonel was assassinated today (March 2) in Dagestan’s capital Makhachkala. The victim, identified as 51-year-old Magomed Musaev, the deputy head of the criminal investigation department in Makhachkala’s Sovietsky district, was shot by unidentified attackers as he drove to work. According to initial reports,... MORE

The death of yet another Dagestani rebel leader this month passed unnoticed against the backdrop of bloody fighting in the border area between Chechnya and Dagestan last week. Like the killings of previous Dagestani insurgent leaders, the latest killing will have little impact on the... MORE

In the last days before his seemingly inevitable reelection for a third 6-year term as president on March 4, Vladimir Putin aggressively attacked internal and external enemies. In the last of a series of seven lengthy articles Putin described his future presidential foreign policy agenda... MORE

On February 27, Russian state television’s Channel One announced that the Russian and Ukrainian security services had thwarted a plot to assassinate Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. The attack allegedly was supposed to take place soon after the March 4 Russian presidential election. Members of the... MORE

A Sino-Russian Alliance to What End?The emergence of a close alliance between the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China would mean a fundamental shift in the strategic balance of power, not seen since the collapse of the Soviet Union or the American opening... MORE

Presidential candidate and Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin, elaborated a detailed agenda for Russia’s defense and security priorities for his widely anticipated next term in office. The lengthy article on February 20 in Rossiyskiya Gazeta covered important aspects of defense, including the modernization of the nuclear... MORE

On February 20, the Memorial Human Rights Center published its October 2011 report on the situation in the mountainous region of Kabardino-Balkaria. The report details the adverse effects of the counter-terrorist regime on the economic situation in this remote and vulnerable republic. A counter-terrorism operation... MORE

The last two weeks before the Russian presidential elections on March 4 saw a pronounced turn toward more aggressive and populist-patriotic campaigning by Vladimir Putin, who appears to be on track to a decisive victory. His team of seasoned courtiers was shocked by the explosion... MORE

Tensions between Dagestan’s law enforcement bodies and residents of the village of Gimry in the republic’s Untsulkysky district flared up on February 21. A large group of Gimry residents blocked the Makhachkala-Botlikh highway to protest the kidnapping of a 40-year-old fellow villager, Magomed Gamzatov. The... MORE

Russia is set to start crude oil exports through the Baltic Pipeline System’s second trunkline, BPS-2, with its Ust-Luga maritime terminal at the Russian end of the Baltic Sea. The BPS-1 trunkline is already operating since 2009 with its Primorsk maritime terminal. The oil is... MORE