Latest Articles about Domestic/Social

The Putin-Medvedev Ruling Tandem Disintegrates
Russia’s tandem rulers – President Dmitry Medvedev and former president and current Prime Minister Vladimir Putin – continue to profess their friendship, but these statements are increasingly unconvincing as the presidential elections that will install a new head of state for six years come closer.... MORE

Moscow Relies on Russian Orthodox Church to Retain Control over Minds in the North Caucasus
On March 22, the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church decreed redrawing the eparchial boundaries in the North Caucasus. Since the Russian Orthodox Church has been known for close cooperation with the Russian state over the past decade, the move attracted substantial attention from... MORE

Strategic Confusion: Russia’s Perpetual Brigade Reform
Russia’s rapid transition in the initial phase of reforming its conventional armed forces from a division-centric to a brigade-centric structure set the target of forming “85 permanent readiness” brigades. On March 26, the Chief of the General Staff Army-General Nikolai Makarov, admitted that the reform... MORE

Stalin’s Shadow Hangs Over Medvedev’s Modernization
One year ago, the plane carrying President Lech Kaczynski and scores of Polish officials crashed 100 meters from the runway hidden by dense fog in Smolensk oblast. On April 11, President Dmitry Medvedev and his Polish counterpart Bronislaw Komorowski will visit the site of this... MORE

China’s Looming Labor Supply Challenge?
China has the largest labor force in the world. In recent years, new strains have emerged in China’s labor supply that raise concerns about the country's economic growth mode. The shortage of migrant workers that gripped the Pearl River Delta region and the coastal areas... MORE

Nazarbayev Celebrates Landslide Victory, Promises Multi-Party Parliament
On April 3, more than nine million voters in Kazakhstan went to the polls to participate in the early presidential election. The final results of the voting announced by the Central Election Commission on April 5, indicates that the incumbent President Nursultan Nazarbayev garnered 95.5... MORE

Armed Attacks Reported in Dagestan
Violence continued in parts of the North Caucasus - particularly in Dagestan – this past week despite the major blow dealt to the North Caucasus rebels by a counter-insurgency operation in which 17 militants were killed. There were reports that Doku Umarov, the Chechen rebel... MORE

Secular And Islamist Opposition Parties In Azerbaijan Plan Further Actions
Watching the serial outbreaks of unrest in Arab countries, Azerbaijan’s radical opposition parties see a possible model for political action in their own country. On the secular side, these groups are much-diminished descendants of the Musavat and Popular Front parties, which continually lost ground from... MORE

Egypt’s Internal Security Service Collapses in a Storm of Charges and Revelations
Trapped somewhere between revolution and counter-revolution, Egypt’s Ministry of the Interior is facing internal collapse amidst a disastrous leak of intelligence files, mysterious fires in records facilities, suggestions the ministry was running false-flag terrorist operations, a loss of judicial immunity and a dramatic deterioration of... MORE

Trial of Indonesia’s Abu Bakr Ba’asyir a Test of Indonesia’s Counterterrorism Resolve
Reputed Jema’ah Islamiya leader Abu Bakr Ba’asyir told the Jamestown Foundation in 2005 that “the highest deed in Islam is jihad” (see Spotlight on Terror, December 16, 2005). After being arrested in August 2010, the Indonesian cleric is now on trial, facing charges under Indonesia’s... MORE