Over nine weeks since the disputed Belarusian presidential election, and three weeks since President Alyaksandr Lukashenka held a secret inauguration ceremony, large street demonstrations in the country continue unabated. In the opinion of Gennady Korshunov, a former director of the Belarusian Institute of Sociology (he... MORE

Nine months ago, when Russian President Vladimir Putin replaced his seemingly eternal number two, then–prime minister Dmitry Medvedev, with a lesser-known bureaucrat, Mikhail Mishustin (see EDM, January 16, 20), few po­liticians and observers in Moscow took the new head of government seriously. However, since his... MORE

Alexei Navalny shocked the Russian political establishment by accusing President Vladimir Putin of personally ordering the special operation to poison him. Navalny, once a leader but who has now emerged as the top leader of the Russian opposition, is recovering in Germany and insists on... MORE

The resumption of Azerbaijani-Armenian hostilities over the Karabakh region, located only 560 kilometers from Georgia’s capital of Tbilisi, has raised concerns within the Georgian government about the consequences of this conflict for the country, which faces tough parliamentary elections on October 31. On October 3,... MORE

The political difficulties and expenses Moscow will face if it seeks to more fully integrate Belarus (see EDM, September 10) are patently visible in the problems—albeit on a smaller scale—the Russian government has had over the past decade in its efforts regarding Abkhazia and South... MORE

In August 2014, in retaliation against the West’s economic sanctions adopted to punish Russian aggression in southeastern Ukraine, Moscow introduced its own package of countersanctions. Kaliningrad Oblast (KO), traditionally heavily dependent on federal subsidies (Rambler.ru, November 9, 2018), was initially hit particularly hard by the... MORE

Arriving at some clarity regarding the situation in Belarus has become harder than ever before. An unstable equilibrium begets a cacophony of opinions that do not lend themselves to generalization or to teasing out a common idea. Alexander Klaskovsky of Belapan writes, “[Presidents Alyaksandr] Lukashenka... MORE

Protests in Belarus and the fighting in Karabakh have upended relations between the Russian authorities and the leaders of Minsk and Yerevan. In the past, Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, despite generally acting in conjunction with Moscow, have nonetheless tried... MORE

Since Vladimir Putin became president, Russia’s forests have declined in size by 45 million hectares, some 6 percent of the country’s total. The shrinking forest cover has been the result of the spread of uncontrolled forest fires (80 percent) as well as increased harvesting (20... MORE

Chechen Healthcare Minister Elkhan Suleymanov has come out in support of Azerbaijan in the latter’s armed conflict with Armenia over Karabakh. Suleymanov wrote on his Instagram account that Azerbaijan, where he was born and grew up, was going through difficult times. “[T]oday, I want to express my... MORE