On June 13–14, the European Union and Azerbaijan held another round of talks on the Strategic Partnership Agreement (SPA). Those ongoing discussions were first inaugurated on February 6, with the official visit of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Brussels. Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA)... MORE

A series of military incidents involving the United States, Russia, and their allies in Syria and the Baltic region have additionally hurt already strained US-Russian relations. As sign of its acute displeasure, Moscow canceled high-level talks between Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov and US... MORE

The Arbitration Institute of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce has preliminarily ruled in favor of the Ukrainian state-owned oil and gas firm Naftohaz Ukrainy over Russian Gazprom’s claims regarding its natural gas supply. The same court is yet to rule on another contract between Naftohaz... MORE

The Russian Space Agency (Roscosmos) made a surprise announcement on June 2. The head of the agency, Igor Komarov, told the media that the first launch of a brand new manned spacecraft called Federation was planned from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in central Kazakhstan in 2022.... MORE

In recent weeks, Moldova has been dealing with one foreign policy scandal after another. Relations with Russia, the United Kingdom, the European Union, the Council of Europe and even the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank have all been strained to varying degrees.... MORE

“Not merely tanks and weapons can kill, words can too,” wrote archbishop Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz, the leader of Belarusian Catholics, in his resentful letter to Svetlana Alexievich, the 2015 Nobel Prize laureate in literature. “The war that Russia started in Donbas is on Russia’s conscience,” Alexievich... MORE

Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni met with Russian President Vladimir Putin, in Sochi, on May 17, a few days before the G7 summit, which was organized by Italy and held in Taormina, Sicily. The Trump-Gentiloni meeting focused on a number of pressing issues, from economic... MORE

The aggressiveness Moscow has shown in its relations with countries in the former Soviet space reflects Russia’s loss of influence via “soft” power channels. At the same time, the Kremlin’s demonstrated bellicosity simply exacerbates that loss. Consequently, if President Vladimir Putin is going to rebuild... MORE

Russia’s best chances to claim a prominent role in the Middle East usually come amidst a regional escalation of tensions. But the confluence of diplomatic rows, terrorist attacks and air strikes at the start of June did not exactly play into Moscow’s hands. As usual,... MORE

At the annual St. Petersburg Economic Forum last week (June 1–3), President Vladimir Putin repeatedly rejected accusations of Russian covert meddling in the 2016 United States presidential election (see EDM, June 5). Putin defended the Russian ambassador in Washington, Sergei Kislyak, who did apparently meet... MORE