Russia has officially ruled out withdrawing from Crimea and gifting the land back to the Ukrainian state, the Russian Defense Ministry reported today. The statement likely will come as hardly a shock to most observers, and was coupled by a statement reaffirming the claim that the region is one “of the Russian Federation” and “not…
After much speculation, Russian President Vladimir Putin has made another public appearance, ending the rumors of his sickness or demise that prompted many news articles over the weekend. This initial appearance is a state visit from Bishkek by President Almzbek Atambayev of Kyrgyzstan. The hashtag #Putinumer spread over Russian twitter users. The huge amount of…
The Collective Security Treaty Organization is an intergovernmental military alliance comprised of six the six members of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) – Russia, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan – and which receives the majority of its financing from Russia. Recently, CTSO Secretary General and Russian general Nikolay Bordyuzha announced the organization’s ability…
The IMF has agreed to funnel some $10 billion in additional assistance funds into Ukraine’s economy as part of a larger four year bailout program. The fund’s board approved a $17.5 billion loan with tranche payments of some $5 billion next week and the other $5 in the next month for Ukraine to borrow against.…
Senior officials from the Pakistani army and Afghan government will be holding open peace talks with the Taliban, marking the first joint effort towards a diplomatic by the two countries simultaneously. Ashraf Ghani’s government is under fire by the new Parliament for negotiating with Pakistan to the degree it has – even former President Hamid…
A letter sent by 47 US senators to Iranian negotiators has been openly decried by Iran’s chief foreign policy representative. Javad Zarif, the Iranian foreign minister, lambasted the letter as lacking in any legal value and as a “propaganda ploy.” Zarif went on to note that the letter is unprecedented in diplomatic history, and a…
Chinese officials announced yesterday that they will buy new natural gas reserves piped in from Western Siberia, another move suggesting Russia’s pivot to the east in reaction to sanctions that cut its economy off from Western capital and retail markets. The agreement specifically is between Gazprom and CNPC (both state-owned oil and gas entities) to…
Officials coming from the latest round of talks of the Caspian littoral states (Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Iran, Russia, and Kazakhstan) have reported major progress in delineating regions of authority in the Caspian Sea. Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Ibrahim Rahimpour reported that he was confident that the dispute and outline could be resolved by the time of the…
A Dushanbe court sentenced leading civil activist Umedjon Solehov to a prison term of 17 years in absentia for “insulting the president,” among other charges. The Ismoili Somoni court handed down the sentenced after Solehov purportedly appeared in a video during a Moscow rally in which he criticized Tajik president Emomali Rahmon and called for his…
The Ukrainian central bank will raise its benchmark refinancing rate to 30%, a more than 10% increase of the current rate of 19.5%. The bank taking this step has been expected, as inflation rates are increasing rapidly and the hryvnia has lost nearly half of its value during 2015. The move by the central bank…
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