The armistice, slowly taking hold in Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk provinces (collectively known as the Donbas region), basically consigns parts of those territories to Russia’s military and political control, both directly and through local proxies. Facing Russia one-on-one, on the battlefield as well as in... MORE

On September 22, the Belarus-USA Investment Forum was held at the Grand Hyatt hotel in midtown Manhattan. The forum featured speakers such as Belarusian Prime Minister Mikhail Myasnikovch, Economy Minister Nikolay Snopkov, Development Bank chairman Sergei Roumas, as well as Minsk-based High Tech Park Director... MORE

On September 9, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani paid his first official visit to Kazakhstan since taking office last August, when he succeeded the much abrasive Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. This visit took place against the backdrop of a new round of direct talks between Tehran and the... MORE

The situation in Ukraine continues to quickly evolve, and the Russian annexation of Crimea has already mostly faded away from the 24-hour news cycle. Additionally, Western leaders are now hinting that at least some of the sanctions putting pressure on Moscow may soon be suspended... MORE

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s six-day trip to South Asia during September 14–19, on state visits to the Maldives, Sri Lanka and India, redoubled China’s efforts to increase its presence in the Indian Ocean while also trying to improve its relations with neighboring India. Xi signed... MORE

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s state visit to Mongolia on August 21–22 signaled closer trilateral economic cooperation between China, Russia and Mongolia on their shared vision of a new Silk Road economic corridor. However, this positive forward momentum must be placed in the context of what... MORE

It is not fashionable, these days, to downplay China’s interest in the Arctic. Recent news that Beijing plans to publish a guidebook on Arctic shipping, that China will receive preferential treatment along the Northern Sea Route (NSR), or that Chinese investors plan to finance Russian... MORE

The shape of any political settlement will depend on whether Russian troops and paramilitary personnel with their weaponry are evacuated from what is legally Ukraine’s territory, or remain deployed there. Point 9 of the September 20 memorandum is unfulfillable as formulated (and it is hard... MORE

On September 20 in Minsk, negotiators from Ukraine, Russia, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE)—which together constitute the Tripartite Contact Group—as well as the Russia-installed Donetsk and Luhansk leaders finalized an agreement on the main elements of an armistice in the ongoing... MORE

On September 11, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani arrived in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s (SCO) annual summit (Ozodi, September 11). On the sidelines of the summit, Rouhani took advantage of his first trip to the small Central Asian republic to ink ten... MORE