Latest Articles about Domestic/Social

Russia’s Skyrocketing Defense Spending, 2022–2023

Russia’s continued aggression against Ukraine and the Kremlin’s attempts to escalate the political situation and prevent defeat on the battlefield through mobilization, nuclear blackmail and possibly even sabotage on gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea raise the question: How do all these factors influence the... MORE

Chinese Companies Are Reshaping Georgia’s Geography

On September 21, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili in New York, during the United Nations General Assembly, and stressed the importance of the Middle Corridor (or Trans-Caspian International Transport Route, “TITR”), which runs directly through Georgia, for regional... MORE

Zelenskyy Bans Negotiations With Putin

On October 4, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy released a decree effectively ruling out negotiations with Russia’s incumbent president. Technically, Zelenskyy’s decree confers legal force on the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council’s (NSDC, or in Ukrainian, RNBO) September 30 decision, which “determin[ed] that holding negotiations... MORE

Mobilization as a Triumph of Political Eschatology

The first week of the “partial mobilization” in Russia, which started on September 21, has demonstrated rampant bureaucratic chaos, a lack of planning and a deficit of training facilities and even basic equipment (72.ru, September 26; Kommersant, September 27; Sekret Firmy, September 28; Ura.ru, September... MORE

Minsk Harnesses Anti-Polish Sentiment

On September 23, Belarusian Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei spoke at the most recent United Nations General Assembly session in New York (Facebook.com/belarusmfa, September 23). Opposition-minded commentators focused on what seems to be a contradiction between two refrains of Makei’s speech. On the one hand, he... MORE