As the Islamic State sought to expand geographically in the months following the declaration of the caliphate in June 2014, Libya initially appeared to be the organization’s most promising frontier outside of Syria and Iraq. Libya’s civil conflict—which has pitted the Libya Dawn military coalition,... MORE

On June 16, the Kurdish militia group People’s Protection Units (Yekîneyên Parastina Gel‎—YPG) and its Free Syrian Army (FSA) allies captured the Islamic State-controlled Syrian town of Tal Abyad on the Turkish border (YPG Rojava, June 16). In addition, in May, a surprise offensive by... MORE

In December 2014, a video testament emerged in which 19-year-old Sultan Berzel, from the Netherlands’ southern city of Maastricht, called on Muslims to make hijra (a religious migration) to the self-proclaimed Islamic State group. He delivered his message in a quiet voice and with a... MORE

Georgia’s 2008 Law on Occupied Territories explicitly bans all domestic and foreign companies from conducting any type of economic (commercial or non-commercial) activities in the Russian-occupied territories of Abkhazia and Tskhinvali region (South Ossetia). Exceptions can be made in certain circumstances but only with the... MORE

While the governor of Dagestan, Ramazan Abdulatipov, has boasted of a drastic reduction in the number of attacks by insurgents in the republic, the Russian authorities’ statistics indicate that attacks in Dagestan are, in fact, increasing. At a recent meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin,... MORE

The collapse in the size of transfer payments from Central Asians working in the Russian Federation—they are down more than half from last year—is having a domino effect in the region and pushing Eurasia into what will, more than likely, be a political perfect storm.... MORE

On September 10, Maksim Shevchenko, a member of the Council for Human Rights under the President of the Russian Federation, unexpectedly announced that the Council would ask President Vladimir Putin to allow the repatriation of Circassian Syrians to the North Caucasus. In an interview with... MORE

Following years of pressure, the government of Tajikistan has finally banned the Islamic Renaissance Party (IRPT), the region’s only faith-based party. In an August 28 statement, the Ministry of Justice declared that the “Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan is no longer a republican party” (Khovar,... MORE

The government in Minsk has long claimed that Belarus’s socioeconomic stability is its major achievement. Indeed, from 1996 to 2014, it experienced positive GDP growth every year, and its living standards were on the rise. However, the conflict in Ukraine ultimately converted this idea of... MORE

Dagestan is the largest republic of the North Caucasus and, at the same time, the region’s most unstable because of the frequent attacks by the armed Islamic opposition movement. The majority of armed militants in the republic currently operate under the flag of the radical... MORE