Staunton, September 22 Vladimir Putin and other dignitaries attended the re-opening of the Cathedral Mosque in Moscow today. Russian media celebrated this as the largest mosque in Europe; they mostly did not focus on the fact that Moscow’s Muslim community is the largest in any European capital or that the Russian city has only three […]
Staunton, September 22 The Mensk Center for Strategic and Foreign Policy Research says that Moscow has not succeeded in gaining the agreement of the Belarusian side to the establishment of a Russian airbase in Belarus but is going ahead anyway, confident that it can push Mensk around given Alyaksandr Lukashenka’s lack of allies elsewhere. In […]
Staunton, September 22 – Russia faces a humanitarian catastrophe of extraordinary proportions this winter, Konstantin Borovoy says, with many Russians now not simply below the poverty line but at risk of survival, a trend that the Russian government has implicitly acknowledged by introducing ration cards for certain categories of the population. Unless Moscow gets enough […]
Staunton, September 20 – Faced with ever greater economic problems at home and isolation abroad, Vladimir Putin needs to freeze the conflict in the Donbass in such a way that Russians won’t begin asking questions about why he went there in the first place, Aleksandr Rabinovich says. And consequently, he is turning up the heat […]
Staunton, September 19 – Vladimir Putin is acting in Syria as he has in Ukraine on the basis of his conviction that no matter what Russia does, Barack Obama will not respond militarily and that as a result, Moscow has every incentive to raise the stakes in order to force negotiations and gain even more […]
‘A Lie isn’t an Alternative Point of View,’ Lithuanian Foreign Minister Reminds the West 2015-09-12 23:59:07 Staunton, September 12, 2015 One of the reasons for the success Vladimir Putin has had in his propaganda efforts is that he has exploited a dangerous trend in Western media – the proclivity of many journalists and their audiences […]
Staunton, September 10, 2015 Putin Opening ‘Second’ and Different ‘Front’ against the West in Syria, Felshtinsky Says 2015-09-11 20:22:51 Staunton, September 10, 2015 With the dispatch of Russian troops to Syria, Vladimir Putin has opened ‘a second front’ against the West, one that is very different in its methods and intentions than the first one […]
Staunton, September 11, 2015 Moscow Mulls Mobilizing Transdniestria and Gagauzia against Pro-Europe Activists in Chisinau 2015-09-11 20:36:08 Staunton, September 10, 2015 An article in the September 10th issue of Nezavisimaya gazeta highlighting opposition by Transdniestria and Gagauzia to the pro-EU protests in the Moldovan capital of Chisinau is another indication that some in Moscow are […]
Staunton, September 4 – Alyaksandr Lukashenka has so far refused Moscow’s demand for the establishment of a Russian military base in Belarus, two senior Belarusian analysts say, noting that in addition to promises of aid, Moscow is currently preparing to destabilize its Western neighbor and even create the conditions for a Russian military intervention. Arseniy […]
Staunton, September 2 – Many people, horrified by the actions of pro-Moscow forces in Crimea and the Donbas or unwilling to continue to resist Russian aggression, have concluded that the rest of Ukraine would be better off without those two regions and could move forward by sacrificing them to Vladimir Putin. “If only everything were […]
