Abkhazia, a former autonomous region of Georgia, was recognized as an “independent state” by Russia following the five-day Russian-Georgian war in August 2008. A couple weeks ago (April 10), the “prime minister” of Abkhazia, Artur Mikvabia, officially presented the self-proclaimed republic’s newest deputy prime minister,... MORE

Observers who have followed the evolution of Russia’s campaign against the Islamic armed resistance in the North Caucasus over the past 16 years probably noticed that Moscow has no strategy in the region, but only a set of chaotic reactions. Apart from special operations, the... MORE

Against the backdrop of the simmering conflict in Kabardino-Balkaria, President Vladimir Putin replaced the interior minister of the republic, Sergei Vasiliev, with a police major-general, Igor Romashkin. Vasiliev had been in office since 2010. The new Kabardino-Balkarian interior minister served as deputy director of the... MORE

The process of electing the Terek Cossack ataman (chieftain) has been quite public and scandalous this year. Moscow’s envoy to the North Caucasus, Sergei Melikov, outlined the views of the government on the future of the Cossacks. He said the entire structure of the currently... MORE

Russian experts have written a series of articles on the future of the North Caucasus in a new age of uncertainty in the Russian Federation. They have attempted to determine under what conditions the current political regime in the region could spiral into chaos. Expectations... MORE

The sixth meeting of the World Forum on Energy Regulation is scheduled to be held on May 25–28, in Istanbul, and is being organized by the office of the prime minister of the Turkish Republic. The competitive and dynamically expanding nature of the energy sector... MORE

Emotions ran high in the Chechen community once again with the news that two school children from Pankisi, Georgia, went to Syria to fight, presumably alongside the Islamic State organization (see EDM, April 16). Earlier in April, 16-year-old Muslim Kushtanashvili and 18-year-old Ramzan Bagakashvili went... MORE

On April 2, two high school boys from Georgia’s Pankisi Gorge, populated by Muslim Chechens (known as Kists in Georgia), disappeared and later contacted their parents, notifying them that they were in Turkey. It is widely believed that the teenagers are heading for Syria, in... MORE

Russia watchers can hardly fail to notice that Moscow often reacts to events in the North Caucasus after a significant time lag. Several amirs of the Caucasus Emirate pledged allegiance to the so-called Islamic State back in November–December 2014. Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), however,... MORE

Six weeks after the assassination of prominent Russian opposition figure Boris Nemtsov near the Kremlin in Moscow, authorities have failed to present a coherent explanation for the crime. As one observer has pointed out: “It looks like the Kremlin has quickly cooled to the investigation.... MORE