On February 22, just two days before Russian tanks and missiles started crossing the Ukrainian border, President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan and President Vladimir Putin of Russia signed a declaration in Moscow vowing to upgrade their bilateral relations to an allied level (Azertag, February 22).... MORE

The Russian war of aggression in Ukraine and fast-mounting tensions between Moscow and the West have spotlighted the strategic significance of Poland. As important as Poland’s political-military potential and capabilities may be, certainly it is this country’s geostrategic position that has currently proven most valuable... MORE

Traditionally, imperial powers sending their armies into foreign countries for purposes of conquest issued explanatory manifestoes to the invaded peoples and to their own. The Kremlin issued the equivalent of such a manifesto in the form of four lengthy television broadcasts on the eve of... MORE

Introduction Trade is the most important element of the relationship between China and the European Union (EU). Although the COVID-19 pandemic has weakened the global economy, the EU remains China’s largest trading partner and China is the EU’s second-largest trade partner. In 2021, bilateral trade... MORE

Introduction What began as a peaceful protest in the Solomon Islands against the government’s decision to switch formal diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China turned deadly in late November. The demonstrations morphed into a violent expression of overall dissatisfaction with Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare’s government.... MORE

Tajikistan Maintains Cool Ties with the Taliban Jacob Zenn Since the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan in August 2021, several Central Asian states have accepted the reality on the ground and engaged the Taliban. Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, for example, began initiating dialogue with the Taliban in... MORE

Moscow has been sharply critical of Ukraine’s welcoming attitude toward non-Russian political refugees from Russia, its attention to the non-Russian nations within the current borders of the Russian Federation, and Kyiv’s willingness to provide a home for a movement dedicated to freedom for the peoples... MORE

At 6 AM Moscow time, on February 24, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin announced in a televised address the start of a “special military operation” by Russian forces against Ukraine. At that hour, Russian ground, naval, and air forces were already moving to attack Ukrainian territory... MORE

On February 21, 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin recognized the Moscow-backed, breakaway Donbas statelets of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) and the Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) as independent sovereign countries, establishing bilateral diplomatic relations and signing defense and friendship treaties with both (see EDM, February... MORE

On February 22, a day after the Kremlin announced it was recognizing eastern Ukraine’s separatist Donetsk and Luhansk “people’s republics” as “independent,” Berlin declared it would indefinitely halt the certification of the Russian Nord Stream Two natural gas pipeline (Kyiv Post, February 22). And though... MORE