People in Georgia’s Pankisi Gorge have been going quietly, one by one, to Tengiz Batirashvili, the younger brother of Umar Shishani (Batirashvili), to express their condolences in connection with Umar Shishani’s death. Unlike his brothers Umar and Tamaz, Tengiz Batirashvili did not go to the... MORE

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s upcoming trip to Azerbaijan (APA, July 6) highlights his country’s growing interest in the nearby South Caucasus region. And indeed, the Republic of Georgia often boasts of its own strategic relationship with Israel. Just this past May, Georgia’s industrious Minister... MORE

Rights activists of Kabardino-Balkaria have challenged official estimates of the number of militants from the republic believed to be fighting in Syria. In April, Kabardino-Balkaria’s Deputy Interior Minister Kazbek Tatuev stated that 130 residents of the republic, including 28 women, were fighting in the Middle... MORE

Perhaps the most important geopolitical development of mid-July 2016 was not the continuing conflict in the South China Sea, the failed coup in Turkey, or terrorist violence in France—all of which attracted considerable international attention—but rather the quiet signing, in Moscow, of an agreement by... MORE

Several paragraphs of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) final Warsaw Summit communiqué (July 9) refer to long-time NATO-aspirant Georgia (Nato.int, July 9). The Alliance expressed its readiness to ramp up dialogue and cooperation with Georgia and Ukraine on strengthening Black Sea regional security. The... MORE

On June 23, the Terek River flooded and destroyed part of the Georgian Military Highway (Voyenno-Gruzinskaya doroga). The highway, which connects Russia to Georgia and Armenia, was closed. The flood caused mudslides and destroyed an estimated 500–600 meters of the highway, blocking the narrow road... MORE

Police in Moscow this week arrested the imam of one of the city’s mosques, Makhmud Velitov. The authorities accused the cleric of “public justification of terrorism” as described in Article 205.2, Part 1 of the Russian Criminal Code. The authorities alleged that Velitov defended a... MORE

Russia’s National Antiterrorist Committee (NAK) reported that during a special operation in Dagestan’s Karabudakhkent district on July 7–8, “as a result of operational and combat activities, the forces of the FSB [Federal Security Service] neutralized nine people” (Riadagestan.ru, July 8). According to the NAK, the... MORE

Cossacks in Ingushetia have appealed to the Terek Cossack Force to accept them as members. The latter is expected to make its decision by this fall. The Cossacks of Ingushetia have asked to become members of the Terek Cossack force for years, so far unsuccessfully.... MORE

Georgian Defense Minister Tina Khidasheli signed a decree, on June 26, effectively abolishing military conscription by the Ministry of Defense (MoD). The decree applies only to the MoD and hence, to only 25 percent of the country’s conscripts. The remaining 75 percent of recruits were... MORE