As expected, Doku Umarov, the leader of the North Caucasus rebels, was not found among those killed near the village of Upper Alkun in the mountainous part of Ingushetia bordering Chechnya during a March 28 major military-police operation employing military aircraft (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru/articles/153198). Nonetheless, the armed... MORE

Insurgency-related violence was reported across the North Caucasus this past week. On April 14, three suspected militants were detained in Kabardino-Balkaria after police stopped a car in which four people were traveling along the Kavkaz federal highway between the villages of Chegem and Shalushka. The... MORE

Russia’s tandem rulers – President Dmitry Medvedev and former president and current Prime Minister Vladimir Putin – continue to profess their friendship, but these statements are increasingly unconvincing as the presidential elections that will install a new head of state for six years come closer.... MORE

On March 22, the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church decreed redrawing the eparchial boundaries in the North Caucasus. Since the Russian Orthodox Church has been known for close cooperation with the Russian state over the past decade, the move attracted substantial attention from... MORE

Russia’s plans to modernize its oil production sector by pursuing international energy partnerships has been dealt a blow as a major deal became mired in legal disputes. Plans by Russia’s largest oil firm Rosneft to implement a share swap agreement with BP were hindered by... MORE

Russia’s rapid transition in the initial phase of reforming its conventional armed forces from a division-centric to a brigade-centric structure set the target of forming “85 permanent readiness” brigades. On March 26, the Chief of the General Staff Army-General Nikolai Makarov, admitted that the reform... MORE

One year ago, the plane carrying President Lech Kaczynski and scores of Polish officials crashed 100 meters from the runway hidden by dense fog in Smolensk oblast.  On April 11, President Dmitry Medvedev and his Polish counterpart Bronislaw Komorowski will visit the site of this... MORE

Expectations raised by Russia’s Foreign Affairs Minister, Sergei Lavrov, about re-starting negotiations to resolve the Transnistria conflict, have shattered on both counts: process and substance. Transnistria’s Moscow-installed authorities have defiantly contradicted Lavrov, with apparent impunity. Moscow has quickly backtracked, and Tiraspol has aborted the attempt... MORE

Violence continued in parts of the North Caucasus - particularly in Dagestan – this past week despite the major blow dealt to the North Caucasus rebels by a counter-insurgency operation in which 17 militants were killed. There were reports that Doku Umarov, the Chechen rebel... MORE

Following reports that Russian air and ground forces had killed 17 militants in an operation targeting a rebel base near the village of Upper Alkun in Ingushetia, Moscow waited with trepidation for the official identification of the body of Doku Umarov, the leader of the... MORE