Earlier this month, the well-known Dagestani weekly newspaper, Novoe Delo, attacked the mayor of the city of Derbent for what it regarded as a servile attitude toward neighboring Azerbaijan. Journalist Ramazan Rajabov wrote: “Against all the protests and clamor by the local Lezgin population, the... MORE

The “commander-in-chief” of the “Novorossiya” defense forces (the Russia-supported separatists fighting in eastern Ukraine), Igor Girkin (a.k.a. Strelkov), told journalists recently that prior to March 31, 2013, he had been a colonel in the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB). By his admission, he had participated... MORE

Thursday’s (July 17) missile hit on Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17 that killed 298 people and left a field of scattered remains in the Donetsk region, some 50 kilometers away from the border with Russia, has become a tragedy that could change the course of the... MORE

Belarus’s Independence Day is celebrated on July 3. On that day, 70 years ago, Minsk was liberated from the Nazi occupiers. This July 3, President Vladimir Putin of Russia participated in Minsk’s celebration. Two days prior to that event, during a grand ceremonial meeting devoted... MORE

Russia is facing a new problem and this concerns the new front that the Chechens have launched outside the North Caucasus. As a result of the brutal suppression of the Chechen armed resistance, only three small groups are left in the republic: the group led... MORE

The Trilateral Contact Group is the latest of several international forums that have emerged in response to Russia’s war against Ukraine (see accompanying article). Established in June, the Contact Group brings together representatives of Ukraine, Russia, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE),... MORE

In Chechnya, yet another problem has been added to the set of existing ones. The Memorial human rights center has designated Ruslan Kutaev as a political prisoner on April 19 (memo.ru, April 19), and earlier this month (July 2014), Amnesty International (amnesty.org) and Human Rights... MORE

Fresh sanctions against Russia imposed by the Barack Obama administration on July 16 will likely hamper Gazprom’s ability to finance the South Stream natural gas pipeline. Among the sanctioned entities are two energy companies, Rosneft and Novatek, and two financial institutions—Russia’s third-largest lender, Gazprombank, and... MORE

On July 17, the United States imposed additional sanction to punish Russia for continuing to support the separatist rebellion in the far eastern Donbas region of Ukraine. Russia’s biggest oil company, Rosneft; major natural gas producer Novotek; two major banks, Gazprombank and VEB; eight major... MORE

A Tbilisi city court has refused to release Gigi Ugulava, the former mayor of the Georgian capital, out on bail, instead sentencing him to two months in pre-trial detention. Ugulava is fighting a series of charges brought against him by the Prosecution and the investigative... MORE