The security situation in the wider Black Sea region is quickly deteriorating and growing more dangerous. Six large, fully loaded amphibious assault ships (three from the Baltic Fleet and three from the Northern Fleet) sailed through the Turkish Straits into the Black Sea “for exercises”... MORE

Fifteen years ago, at the 2007 Munich Security Conference, President Vladimir Putin surprised the high-level audience with a speech that explicitly juxtaposed Russian and Western security interests. In retrospect, the tone of the presentation was argumentative rather than assertive, but Moscow added force to its... MORE

French President Emmanuel Macron held talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv on February 7 and 8, respectively. Overshadowing the talks were Russian forces staging a war scare near Ukraine’s borders. Macron is attempting a solo act,... MORE

On February 7, French President Emmanuel Macron visited Moscow and spent over five hours talking with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, in an attempt to negotiate a de-escalation of the present acute security crisis over Ukraine (Kremlin.ru, February 8). France holds the rotating presidency of... MORE

On February 1, the first day of the legislative spring session, the Georgian parliament adopted a resolution in support of Ukraine that fell short of mentioning the Russian Federation. The ruling Georgian Dream (GD) party had tabled this resolution, which lawmakers adopted with 74 votes... MORE

In mid-December 2021, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev received an invitation from his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskyy (Trend.az, December 15, 2021), and within a month, he was paying a working visit to Kyiv amidst the security crisis around Ukraine and a large-scale cyberattack on Ukrainian government... MORE

Russia’s conventional Armed Forces have deployed approximately 30,000 personnel to Belarus for the joint strategic-operational military exercise Allied Resolve (Soyuznaya Reshimost) 2022, scheduled for February 10–20, by far eclipsing any previous deployment to the country since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 (see... MORE

Even though Russian officialdom continues to insist Moscow has no plans to invade Ukraine, many Russian political commentators in recent weeks have been increasingly aggressive in suggesting that their country can easily defeat and occupy its largest western neighbor and that there is nothing the... MORE

On January 20, Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs Peter Szijjártó gave an exclusive interview to the state-owned Russian news agency TASS, advocating for long-term agreements for natural gas imports to Europe and voicing hopes that Hungary’s own supply contract with Gazprom will be extended (TASS... MORE

*To read Part One, please click here. An itemized list of Ukraine’s latest request for German security assistance has found its way into two major German papers (Süddeutsche Zeitung, Der Spiegel, February 5). The Ukrainian embassy and the military attaché’s office in Berlin addressed this... MORE