Soon after amnesty was offered in early August 2009, few seemed to take notice when Osama Bin Laden surrendered to authorities. Two weeks later, the leader led more than 20 of his militant followers to do the same. In an interview that day, Bin Laden... MORE

Last month, the Russian President Dmitry Medvedev visited the large-scale military exercises Zapad 2009 held in Russia’s Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad and in Belarus. In Kaliningrad, Medvedev observed a landing by marines with the support of naval battleships and airpower. In Belarus, along with President... MORE

On June 12, the liberal left Taraf daily published an unclassified document outlining an alleged action plan for the military to combat the “reactionary activities” against secularism. Allegedly the “Action Plan against Reactionaries (Irtica),” was prepared by senior staff Colonel Dursun Cicek and defined the... MORE

A suspected rebel in Chechnya yesterday (October 27) detonated a grenade, killing himself and a policeman, in one of several violent incidents involving insurgents and security forces in the North Caucasus over the last several days.Chechen Interior Minister Ruslan Alkhanov said that the incident took... MORE

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan paid an official visit to Pakistan on October 25-26 in a bid to boost bilateral relations. He was accompanied by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, and other ministers. Erdogan met with his Pakistani counterpart Yousuf Raza Gilani. They signed a... MORE

On October 8 Nikolai Patrushev, the Secretary of the Russian Security Council and the former Director of the Federal Security Service (FSB), signaled planned changes to the country’s nuclear doctrine. He explained in Novosibirsk that this will be reflected in the new military doctrine titled:... MORE

A Russian military foothold in Serbia is potentially the most significant result of President Dmitry Medvedev’s October 20 visit to the country. This intention has greater chances of materializing, compared with the Serbian section of Gazprom’s South Stream project, an agreement on which was also... MORE

The longtime Ingush opposition leader and businessman Maksharip Aushev was shot to death in Kabardino-Balkaria yesterday (October 25). The incident took place around 9:30 a.m., local time, on a road near the village of Nartan in Kabardino-Balkaria’s Chegemsky district. The unidentified attackers fired more than... MORE

Only 24 hours passed between Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s warm welcome to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in the presidential palace in Damascus and the attacks on the government buildings in Baghdad that killed dozens and spoiled the development of fraternal relations between the two... MORE

As the U.S. military prepares for rapid disengagement from Iraq following parliamentary elections to be held early next year, growing Arab-Kurdish tensions in northern Iraq over the ownership of “disputed territories” are emerging as the main threat to Iraqi stability. In response to rising violence... MORE