On September 14, 2014, Crimea held its first post-annexation local elections. Since after the takeover, all the political posts of the Crimean parliament were filled with self-appointed actors. For pro-Russia groups, these so-called democratic elections to the local legislatures of Crimea and Sevastopol as well... MORE

Utter confusion surrounds Ukraine’s just-adopted law on the “special procedure of local self-administration in individual districts in the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces.” Pursuant to the September 5 ceasefire protocol, President Petro Poroshenko initiated this law, his administration drafted it, and the parliament adopted it on... MORE

On September 18, the authorities in Dagestan closed down the Gimry tunnel, citing the ongoing counter-terrorist operation in Untsukul district. A counter-terrorist operation was also introduced in the adjacent Buinaksk district on September 17. Locals estimated that over 1,000 military personnel blocked the areas around... MORE

Ukraine’s law on the “special procedure of local self-administration in individual districts in the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces” (Ukraiynska Pravda, September 16; see Part One of this article) seeks to retain at least some means of influence and avenues of dialogue between Kyiv and local... MORE

On September 16, the Ukrainian parliament approved a “Law on the special procedure of local self-administration in individual districts in Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk provinces” (Russian version’s terminology: poryadok, samo-upravlenie, raiony). Those two provinces of Ukraine are now, de facto, partitioned into Russian-controlled and Ukrainian-controlled... MORE

On September 11, an apparently frustrated Georgian President Giorgi Margvelashvili announced that his visit to the United States to attend and address the annual session of the United Nations in New York City was deliberately thwarted by Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili and his office.... MORE

The Russian business community was shocked by the arrest this week (September 16) of one of Russia’s richest industrialists—billionaire-tycoon Vladimir Yevtushenkov (65), accused of money laundering. In 2009, Yevtushenkov acquired Bashneft, a major oil and petrochemical company. Prosecutors allege Bashneft was illegally privatized by Ural... MORE

Russia’s war against Ukraine is a multi-dimensional conflict undertaking. It has come to a standstill on the battlefield in Ukraine, but continues nonetheless in its military aspect (below the combat threshold) and in its political, economic, propaganda, and cultural aspects. Russia’s overall objective is to... MORE

Mihai Balan, director of Moldova’s Intelligence and Security Service (SIS), says the organization has evidence that Moscow is planning to stage provocations in his country in the coming weeks, in advance of the Moldovan November parliamentary elections. Russia will utilize not only traditional sources of... MORE

Alyaksandr Lukashenka has somewhat softened his rhetoric about the supposed crucial role of the United States in sparking the Ukrainian crisis (see EDM, September 9). On September 9, during his visit to the Minsk Industrial Leather Association, he said that “the root causes of the... MORE