Russia
Disasters and Reconstruction Initiatives
Berlin Ukraine Recovery Conference
Although partially overshadowed by urgent Ukrainian requests for emergency help with its immediate air defense needs, as well as political shockwaves emanating from the...
China
Xi challenges a divided Europe
After the May 5-9 visit of President Xi Jinping to Europe most of the political analysts in Brussels who argued that the Chinese President's...
Interviews
Tackling new threats to critical energy infrastructure
The explosions that targeted the Nord Stream pipelines from Russia to Germany in September 2022 and the suspected sabotage of Baltic-connector pipeline, which supplies...
Op-Eds & Guest Contributors
EU-Armenia-U.S. High-level Meeting: A Critical Moment for the South Caucasus
On April 5, an EU-Armenia-U.S. trilateral meeting was held between European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and U.S....
Nuclear
The influence of Russia’s nuclear industry steadily expanding in Turkey
Turkey's decision last month that Russian State Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom will build the country’s second nuclear power plant, most likely at a site...
Democracy & Human Rights
U.S. joins International Coalition for the Return of Ukrainian Children
On March 7, the office of the spokesperson at the U.S. Department of State issued a media note, clearly meant to be circulated in...
Columns
Eyeing competitors, OPEC+ countries will keep cutting oil production
Several OPEC+ countries are extending additional voluntary cuts of 2.2 million barrels per day, aimed at supporting what they are labeling "the stability and...
Russia Sanctions
Russia sanctions remain a powerful tool to support Ukraine’s defense
Western leaders should not dismiss the two-year long sanctions campaign (as opposed to the 2014 Crimea sanctions) as unsuccessful simply because the Kremlin has...
Russia Sanctions
New U.S. Russia sanctions widen scope, adding 500 new targets
The U.S. State Department released a comprehensive list of new sanctions measures on February 23, clearly the culmination of months of preparation in order...
Op-Eds & Guest Contributors
Moldova’s 2024 elections: Why it matters
Since the war in Ukraine commenced, the neighboring Republic of Moldova, led by President Maia Sandu, has strongly supported Kyiv. As the tiny, landlocked...
Bulgaria
Bulgaria, Romania push regional renewable energy projects
Bulgaria is working with its neighbors to boost energy security and collaborate on joint cross-border projects in natural gas and renewables, according to Bulgaria’s...
Disinformation & Propaganda
Kremlin disinformation efforts in Africa illuminated
The U.S. State Department released a report detailing Kremlin disinformation activities and operatives in Africa on February 12 entitled “The Kremlin’s Efforts to Spread...
Ukraine
Ukraine’s persecuted mayor
Lest it be forgotten, the major thematic issue in post-Maidan and pre-war Ukraine was, and continues to be, the transformation of Ukrainian society along...
Armenia
Russia’s powerful economic levers over Armenia
Armenia's relations with its strategic partner Russia are getting worse and worse and its leaders seem to desire a shift in geopolitical orientation towards the West....
Democracy & Human Rights
Meeting conditions for Georgia’s EU accession is a tall order for Tbilisi
The European Commission’s provisional endorsement of Georgia’s EU chances contained a not-so-subtle message couched in diplomatic jargon: Tbilisi must forge a stronger national consensus...
Economy & Business
New US actions against corruption and Russian malign influence in the Western Balkans
On November 16, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, known by its acronym OFAC, designated eight individuals and six...
Democracy & Human Rights
On confronting evil in the modern world
Now is an appropriate time to morally clarify the underlying narrative of what is happening in Israel and Ukraine.
Survivors of the last century’s greatest...
Invasion of Ukraine
It takes time to defeat a dictatorship
Whether it is acknowledged or not, Ukraine and the West are in the process of learning a very hard but essential lesson about the...
Op-Eds & Guest Contributors
Breaking Europe’s hold on football
The 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar brought together nations from around the world, and 1.5 billion people tuned in to watch the final. But...
Armenia
With Armenia defeated tensions between Yerevan and Russia reach a turning point
Relations between Armenia and its traditional strategic partner Russia are deteriorating fast. With Yerevan's fundamental defeat in Nagorno-Karabakh - the 30-year-old Moscow-backed separatist region...
Invasion of Ukraine
Prigozhin’s inglorious rebellion
Images of camouflaged gunmen seizing government buildings in a post-Soviet city were eerily reminiscent of what the world witnessed in the spring of 2014...
Invasion of Ukraine
Conflict, migration, and demography in Russia and its border regions
Despite the absence of a clear definition of “ethnic group,” the term generally refers to people with a common history, culture, and ancestry. Russians...
Invasion of Ukraine
Working against Ukraine’s own interests
As the Ukrainian counter-offensive begins, maintaining American support is absolutely vital to Kyiv’s success. The Ukrainian Armed Forces have proven their courage, but even...
Analysis
A post-Berlusconi Italy could find itself at an era-defining political turning point
A new era began in Italy on June 12 when Silvio Berlusconi, the polarizing and towering political figure who dominated Italian politics for nearly...
The Negroni Diaries
Ukraine’s ‘Doolittle Raid’
Ukraine has proven that a numerically superior combatant can be defeated when confronted with superior tactics and a better-trained, motivated, and equipped opponent.
IT & Telecom
Washington issues reward offer for Russian ransomware actor
On May 16, the State Department announced a reward offer, under the Transnational Organized Crime Rewards Program, of up to $10 million, for information...
Defense & Security
When it comes to defense, the politicians must listen to those who know best – the generals
The halls of power are walked by people who know little, care even less and yet have the right to supersede and ignore the advice of those who know better.
Georgia
Georgia has shown the world that a Kremlin project can be defeated
In early March, the world’s attention was on Georgia. We saw massive protests fueled by anger, concerns and fear, and eventually, we witnessed a...
Europe & Eurasia
Putin’s New START withdrawal has broad implications
Vladimir Putin continues to persuade Russians that the West provoked his imperialist war of aggression against Ukraine. His announcement that he would no longer...
Defense & Security
Providing Ukraine with advanced Western fighters is a logical step towards battlefield success
While Ukraine may have weathered the storm of Russia’s initial onslaught and retaliated with a force and determination largely thought to have been beyond...
Belarus
A Belarusian politician, fraudster and businessman kept money in Credit Suisse
It was the last summer day of 2008. An Audi was waiting in line to leave Belarus for Poland. Petr Kalugin, a House of Representatives deputy,...
Armenia
Turkey’s seismic shift
This breakthrough in normalization between Armenia and Turkey comes amid a much wider context, well beyond the simple validation of earthquake diplomacy to elevate crisis response over conflict retention.
Invasion of Ukraine
What a difference one year makes
Ukraine’s steadfastness has shown Putin's dreams of a post-Soviet Russian Empire are pure fiction.
Armenia
Armenia’s parliament could take steps to severely curtail press freedom in the country
Armenian authorities appear to be using the South Caucasus nation's military conflict with neighboring Azerbaijan as an excuse to curtail press freedom.On January 6,...
Columns
Could this be the end of the Chekist renaissance?
Russia's once all-powerful successor to the KGB - the FSB - is watching its status crumble after major military defeats in Ukraine.
Columns
Putin threatens global security with renewed nuclear saber rattling
Putin's maniacal compulsion to start a nuclear war is not just a sinister ultimatum to world peace, it is simply mad.
Europe & Eurasia
Has Armenia killed the South Caucasus peace process?
Despite the issuance elaborate diplomatic statements detailing the various policy spheres in which discussions were held, Armenia’s prime minister, Nikol Pashinyan, publicly stated that “no concrete results” had been reached regarding a peace deal between Azerbaijan and Armenia.
Invasion of Ukraine
Pentagon’s reported change on targeting could result in a more costly, earlier defeat for Moscow
The idea that a country which Russians have been told could never put up effective resistance is actually winning, dragging their country into a grim battle of attrition, will do more to make Russian people doubt their leadership than any inhumane rocket attack against their cities.
Columns
Erdogan & Putin’s plan to create a gas hub in Turkey is a purely anti-Western political ploy
The initiative would be a significant political move by Ankara and Moscow that directly challenges the West and its support for Ukraine.
Bulgaria
US discusses energy security, diversification in Turkey, Romania, Bulgaria
The United States discussed joint efforts on European energy security and advanced the clean energy transition in Turkey, Romania and Bulgaria during the visit...
Russia
Major Japanese auto companies giving up on Russia
Toyota and Nissan, two major Japanese automakers with substantial manufacturing capacity, pulled out of Russia after both claimed that carrying out any future business...
Energy
International power plays
Countries often seem to behave like children in a schoolyard. Some will be loners, others want to be part of a gang. There is...
Africa
Moscow is moving Wagner mercenaries from Syria and Africa to Ukraine
Media reports from around the world have indicated that more than 1,000 mercenaries from Russia's infamous private military company Wagner have been transferred from...
Invasion of Ukraine
Russia’s invasion: A decisive human failure
War in Europe has moved into its third week. While the full end result is not yet clear, a new reality is starting to...
Belarus
A message to the Russian people
I begin to write to you in the quiet moments of the night, having been once again awakened by the wailing sirens that warn...
Invasion of Ukraine
Ukraine: De-escalation and negotiations are the only way out of this crisis
War is a tragedy, a crime, and a defeat. Citizens of the world should condemn the decision of Russian President Vladimir Putin to abandon...
Invasion of Ukraine
No impunity for Putin’s flagrant aggression
It turned out worse than most Western politicians and military experts had expected. In the morning hours of February 24, the Armed Forces of...
Global Energy Insider
After Russian hammer in Ukraine, sanctions talk brings sickle to oil prices
Oil prices slipped on February 25 after sharp rises early in the session as traders were concerned that sanctions against Moscow following Russia’s invasion...
Invasion of Ukraine
Putin’s invasion of Ukraine was inevitable
lIt's always something of a double-edged sword to trot out an 'I-told-you-so' when something catastrophic happens, but with ongoing events in Ukraine proving to...
Belarus
Russia is slowly annexing Belarus
As the international community anxiously observes the situation near the Russo-Ukrainian border, another development has been afoot. Russia and Belarus are slowly morphing into...
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