Dmitry Kozak, Russian deputy prime minister and special envoy of President Vladimir Putin for Moldovan affairs, visited Moldova twice within three weeks (June 2-4 and 24–25) to facilitate the transition from billionaire Vladimir Plahotniuc’s pocket government toward a coalition of pro-Russia and pro-Western parties. The... MORE

Introduction—Disputes Over the Extradition Bill Spill into the Streets of Hong Kong On Sunday, June 9, just over one million Hong Kong residents took part in a protest rally against the introduction of the “Fugitive Offenders and Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters Legislation (Amendment)... MORE

*To read Part One, please click here.   Moldova had become a paradigmatic case of state capture under the rule of Vladimir Plahotniuc, in a sequence comparable to what happened in Georgia under Bidzina Ivanishvili. The paradigm involves personal, informal control over state institutions by... MORE

A new escalation in the long-running conflict between Russia and Georgia happened almost by chance last week (starting on June 20), but it answered the anxious desire in the Kremlin to move Russia proactively from the path of gradual decline. Russian President Vladimir Putin likely... MORE

On Rustaveli Avenue, in central Tbilisi, a rally of pro-Western opposition and student organizations has assembled near the Georgian parliament building and continues into its fifth day. On this spot began all of the most important events in the modern history of Georgia, including the... MORE

Moldova is hosting (on June 24) a European Parliament delegation led by David McAllister, the chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee. The European visitors aim to “take stock of the political situation in Moldova and exchange views with the country’s new government” (David-mcallister.de, June 21).... MORE

On the night of June 10, around two hundred young Dagestanis gathered to protest at a road sign that had been installed on the outskirts of the city of Kizlyar, Dagestan, only several hours before. The signpost, which the demonstrators ultimately dismantled, read “Chechen Republic,... MORE

The fall of Moldova’s ruler, Vladimir Plahotniuc, this month (see EDM, June 10) concludes a ten-year historical cycle for the country. Ever since the Communist Party’s loss of power in 2009, a nominally democratic, self-described pro-Western government was in charge in Chisinau. From 2010 onward,... MORE

Fyodor Lukyanov, Russia’s premier political commentator and the chair of the Council for Foreign and Defense Policy, recently wrote an article titled, “Former [Soviet] Union Republics Enter New Development Phase. And Russia Is Touched by This Process, Too” (Global Affairs, June 13). In the piece,... MORE

For most of the Soviet period after 1945, Russians informally viewed Mongolia as “the 16th Soviet republic” not only because it tried to become one during World War II, but also because, even more than Bulgaria, it slavishly copied Soviet laws and practices. Notably, Mongolia... MORE