On June 8–10, Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov paid a two-day visit to Yerevan, where he met with Armenian leaders and attended a foreign ministerial session of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) (Armeniasputnik.am, June 8). His talks with the Armenian representatives and his statements... MORE

While Ukraine is engaged in an all-out effort to convince its Western partners to increase and speed up weapons assistance so that it can defend itself more effectively against Russian aggression, Moldova has taken a different tack. Ever since the start of the Russian re-invasion... MORE

After the start of the 2022 war, in which the Russian Federation initially deployed about 180,000 soldiers and approximately 120 battalion tactical groups (BTGs) against Ukraine, the Russian military quickly began to experience significant problems with logistics and personnel. The true size and structure of... MORE

Ukraine experienced sharp demographic decline even before Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale re-invasion earlier this year. The Ukrainian population fell from 52 million in 1993 to just over 41 million by the start of 2022. For that matter, it would have been declining... MORE

President Emmanuel Macron’s recent warning not to “humiliate” Russia (Ouest-france.fr, June 3), while he continues to try to mediate Russia’s “exit” from the war in Ukraine, drew ire from Ukrainian officials, echoed by both Ukrainian and Russian experts and even some French thinkers. Not only... MORE

The full-scale re-invasion of Ukraine, ordered by Russian President Vladimir Putin on February 24, came as a shock for many groups within the Russian elite. They are still assessing the consequences of that autocratic decision and adapting to the fast-deteriorating political and economic environment. Meanwhile,... MORE

Although Turkey is no longer as dramatically active in the North Caucasus as during the 1990s, when it backed Chechen aspirations for independence, Ankara is quietly expanding its use of soft power mechanisms there. As Russian analyst Andrey Areshov writes, these overtures toward the region—increasingly... MORE

The authorities’ crackdown on the massive 2020 post-election protests resulted in a cardinal change to Belarus’s international relations and its regional security nexus. From aspiring to be a middle ground between Russia and the European Union and even a would-be Switzerland (see EDM, November 18,... MORE

Over the years, Moscow has poured in vast sums of money to support its loyalists in Ukraine, cultivating the ground for further military incursion. And after the Kremlin launched its massive re-invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, many such pro-Kremlin Ukrainian politicians suddenly surfaced... MORE

A group of Soviet-built T-62M main battle tanks were recently spotted in an occupied area of Kherson Oblast. The units were equipped with metal grids over the turrets, apparently as some sort of improvised protection (Mil.in.ua, June 5). That account marked a continued trend in... MORE