Since the Russian state moved into non-Russian areas, it has generally been able to play Cossack units against the local non-Russians in order to strengthen its own position. It did that in the Middle Volga, in Siberia and the Russian Far East, as well as... MORE

Russian military strategists who have analyzed regional military conflicts between 1999 and 2014 conclude that even a less-developed party may be able to at least partly degrade the technological advantage of a stronger adversary if the weaker power can attain information superiority over its opponent... MORE

In late August 2018, Russia’s Caspian Flotilla, in conjunction with aviation and coastal air-defense groups, carried out special exercises in the Caspian Sea to test a new tactical formation for detecting and neutralizing low-flying missiles or aircraft (Tvzvezda.ru, August 29). This exercise occurred only days... MORE

Of all the international borders in the Caucasus, the one between Azerbaijan and Georgia would appear to be the least problematic. The two countries have good relations as partners within GUAM (the loose political association of Georgia, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan and Moldova). And several key east-west... MORE

Recent weeks and months have seen at least five key developments that appear to demonstrate a renewed rapprochement between Baku and Moscow: First, on July 1, a group of high-profile Russian public figures, members of parliament (MP) and experts visited Azerbaijan’s village of Jojug Marjanli... MORE

Following bilateral closed-door talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin, in Moscow, on September 8, Armenia’s interim Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan told journalists that Russia and Armenia would soon launch a “joint humanitarian mission” in Syria (Azatutyun.am, September 8). The operation, apparently requested by Bashar al-Assad’s... MORE

The governments of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Iran and Turkmenistan gathered in the Kazakhstani port city of Aktau, on August 12, and signed the Convention on the Caspian Sea’s Legal Status. Among other important points, Article 14 of the Convention recognizes the parties’ right to lay... MORE

In an interview last month (August 16) with the media outlet Azeri Daily, Azerbaijani member of parliament and the head of the Azerbaijan-Russia inter-parliamentary group, Ali Huseynli, suggested that, considering the changed geopolitical conditions in the South Caucasus, “it would be possible [he later also... MORE

On August 30, five young Georgian citizens, detained by Russian service members for “illegally crossing the state border of South Ossetia,” were released from a Tskhinvali jail after having paid a fine of 2,000 Russian rubles ($29.61) (Civil Georgia, August 31). The youths had been... MORE

United States President Donald Trump’s behavior at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) recent summit in Brussels (July 11–12) and in its aftermath has cast a shadow on this landmark event. Trump’s follow-up actions, including the meeting with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, continued hitting... MORE