
Latest Articles about The Caucasus

Moscow Reduces Aid to the North Caucasus: Jeopardizing the Precarious Security Environment
On September 11, the Russian minister for regional development, Dmitry Kozak, announced that because of the ongoing economic crisis, Moscow will have to divert some of the financial aid earmarked for the North Caucasus republics to other regions of Russia (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, September 12). The move... MORE

Russian Military Digs in for the Long Haul in Georgian Territories
On September 15 in Moscow, the Russian Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov signed agreements on military cooperation with the "defense ministers" (Russian citizens Kishmaria and Tanayev) of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. On the same occasion Russia's Border Guard Service command, subordinated to the Federal Security Service... MORE

NATO Supply Routes Through the South Caucasus
As the situation in the Khyber Pass deteriorates the region of the South Caucasus is becoming an increasingly viable option for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) non-military supply routes to Afghanistan. In March 9-11, transportation and logistics experts from Turkey, Georgia and Azerbaijan met... MORE

Chechen Security Sources Predict New Attacks in Republic
There has been a fresh wave of insurgent attacks and shootouts between rebels and security forces across the North Caucasus as the security situation in the region remains highly problematic.A bomb went off on a railroad bed in Dagestan today. No one was hurt in... MORE

Azerbaijan Nervously Watching Turkish-Armenian Rapprochement
The Turkish-Armenian agreement on September 1 to start political consultations aimed at establishing diplomatic relations between the two countries has once again raised concerns in Baku. It is only four months since the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited Baku and assured Azerbaijani politicians... MORE

Insurgent Attacks and Apparent Government-Backed Counter-Violence Plague Dagestan
Dagestan's President Mukhu Aliev has denounced a claim by two leading Russian human rights activists that Dagestan has illegal prisons and extrajudicial killings.On September 8, the Memorial human rights center made public an open letter signed by its head, Oleg Orlov, and Lev Ponomarev, head... MORE

U.N. General Assembly Calls for Refugees’ Return to Georgia’s Abkhazia and South Ossetia
On September 9 the United Nations General Assembly condemned the "forced displacement" of the population from Georgia's Abkhazia and South Ossetia territories, strongly upheld the displaced populations' right to return there, and defined these territories as parts of Georgia.Georgia had initiated the General Assembly's resolution... MORE

Chechen Government Inadequately Prepared for Suicide Bombers
As Russian President Dmitry Medvedev finally had to admit, the situation in the North Caucasus is slowly changing for the worse and not for the better (Prime-Tass, August 19). Medvedev's admission stands in stark contrast to the public position of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who... MORE

Turkish-Abkhazia Ties Test Turkey’s Strategic Partnership with Georgia
The plight of the Turkish captain of a tanker intercepted by Georgian authorities while carrying goods en route to Abkhazia highlighted the dilemmas of Turkey's position on the Georgian-Abkhazian conflict.Since the war last August, Georgia has blockaded the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia... MORE

An Anonymous Letter Spreads Fear Among Dagestan’s Civil Activists
Lengthy leaflets attacking Islamists in Dagestan and their supporters began to appear in Makhachkala during the first week of September and have alarmed human rights activists and journalists in the republic. The authors of the leaflet state that they have a list of 250 people... MORE