Latest Articles about South Caucasus
MOSCOW MULTIPLYING EXTRANEOUS PRECONDITIONS TO TROOP WITHDRAWAL FROM GEORGIA
After a two-year interruption and ten years of futile talks, another round of Russian-Georgian negotiations on the withdrawal of Russian troops was held in vain on February 10-11 in Tbilisi. The Russian side advanced conditions that amount to a refusal to withdraw its troops from... MORE
OSCE DELEGATION BEGINS RECOMMENDATIONS FOR SETTLING KARABAKH DISPUTE
The week-long OSCE fact-finding mission on Karabakh ended February 6, leaving both Armenia and Azerbaijan impatiently waiting for the final report. Ten experts from Finland, Italy, Sweden, and Germany, as well as the co-chairs of the OSCE's Minsk group from Russia, France, and the United... MORE
WILL ZHVANIA’S DEATH UNDERMINE GEORGIA’S DELICATE POLITICAL BALANCE?
Georgian Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania was buried on Sunday, February 6, becoming the 101st distinguished Georgian to be interred in the Didube memorial in Tbilisi. As the Georgian people paid their last respect to Zhvania at the St. Trinity Cathedral in Tbilisi, confidants of Zhvania... MORE
ARMENIANS COUNT THEIR LOSSES AS THEIR CURRENCY GROWS STRONGER
Armenia's national currency, the dram, has appreciated dramatically against the euro and especially against the U.S. dollar over the past year, hitting hard a large part of the country's population. The real causes of this phenomenon have been a matter of serious contention in recent... MORE
NEW GROUP OF GEORGIA’S FRIENDS FOUNDED
Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, and Bulgaria founded the "New Group of Georgia's Friends" on February 4 in Tbilisi. The specification "new" differentiates it from the decade-old "Group of Friends of Georgia," originally comprised of the United States, Germany, Britain, and France. That old group... MORE
DEATH OF GEORGIA’S PRIME MINISTER ZHVANIA RAISES QUESTIONS
The sudden death of Georgian Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania last night (February 2) has plunged the country into shock. The news of Zhvania's death comes on the heels of the car bomb that exploded in Gori two days ago, killing at least a dozen people.... MORE
AZERBAIJAN’S PRESIDENT IN IRAN
Some flowery rhetoric from Tehran notwithstanding, Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliev's January 24-26 official visit to Iran turned out to be a routine event that confirmed the tension-free relations between neighboring countries, without evidence of rapprochement at U.S. expense. Such a rapprochement had been the subject... MORE
RUSSIA CLAIMS STRATEGIC VICTORY IN GEORGIAN PRIVATIZATION ROUND
When Tbilisi recently completed the privatization of several Georgian industrial giants, Russian companies had become owners of several strategic economic entities in Georgia. All indications suggest that the Russian firms are not finished with their Georgian acquisition plans. Evraz Holding has taken ownership of 70.8%... MORE
AZERBAIJAN CELEBRATES DIPLOMATIC VICTORY, BUT WHAT NEXT FOR KARABAKH?
For the last several days, Azerbaijani politicians and the general public have been celebrating a diplomatic victory. After several hours of intense and heated debate on January 25, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe adopted a resolution on the Karabakh conflict. The resolution,... MORE
UN SECURITY COUNCIL’S HANDLING OF ABKHAZIA: A DISQUIETING PRELUDE TO BUSH-PUTIN SUMMIT
On January 28, the UN Security Council (UNSC) voted to approve a routine six-month extension of the UNOMIG (UN Observer Mission in Georgia) mandate to observe the ceasefire in Abkhazia. The UNSC had finalized the wording of the relevant resolution at a closed-door meeting on... MORE