Given how centralized the Soviet Union was and President Vladimir Putin’s Russia is today, the role regions within the Russian Federation have played in promoting Kremlin policies in neighboring countries is often overlooked. But in Soviet times, Moscow regularly employed regions and republics along the... MORE

On July 9, Canadian Minister of Natural Resources Jonathan Wilkinson announced that his country will return confiscated Nord Stream One turbines to Germany, providing Siemens with a temporary exemption from the existing sanctions regulations (La Presse, July 9). The equipment was seized by Canadian authorities,... MORE

*To read Part One, please click here. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) had blocked Ukraine’s membership track long before Russia’s 2022 re-invasion of Ukraine. The summit in Madrid (June 28–30) changed nothing in this respect. While the proverbial door remained open to Ukraine in... MORE

The Russian State Duma (lower chamber of parliament) deputy from Kurgan, Aleksandr Iltyakov, launched a surprise blistering verbal attack against the governor of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, for the latter’s ostentatious visits to the war zone in Ukraine. The lawmaker criticized Kadyrov’s behavior and alluded to... MORE

Russia’s war on Ukraine has prompted the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the European Union to examine current security vulnerabilities in Europe and find a way to address them. One of the major areas of focus has been the Balkans, and three outstanding security... MORE

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is what the political leaders in the capitals of member countries make it to be. The summit just held confirmed this reality (see EDM, July 6, 7, November 7, 2019, Part One and Part Two). NATO decisions necessitate working... MORE

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) new Strategic Concept, approved at the summit just held in Madrid, strongly emphasizes Russia’s multidimensional threats to the Alliance. By way of response, the Concept singles out the task of deterrence and defense from among the Alliance’s core tasks... MORE

Spitzbergen, the largest and only continually inhabited island of the Svalbard Archipelago, located in the Arctic Ocean, 1,000 kilometers north of Norway, is on its way to becoming a new hotspot in the emerging cold war between the Russian Federation and the West (Nrk.no, June... MORE

After more than four months of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, open-source data confirms that the Russian Armed Forces lost, at a minimum, over 830 tanks and 1,650 different types of armored vehicles (destroyed, damaged, abandoned or captured) as well as dozens of combat aircraft and... MORE

In late June, Belarusian Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei gave an extensive interview to Sputnik, a state-backed Russian media and propaganda outlet with affiliates in several countries, including Belarus. One of the overarching and persistent themes emerging from his remarks was the adamant rejection of the... MORE