Senior political-military officials in Moscow have recently stepped up their focus on strengthening bilateral military ties with Minsk. This is aimed at shoring up the Union State of Russia and Belarus, reflecting long-standing close military cooperation, as well as the pivotal role Minsk plays in... MORE

A new government offensive in Mozambique’s northern Cabo Delgado province is the latest attempt to eliminate shadowy Islamist insurgents in a region whose untapped energy reserves could reverse the country’s economic misfortunes and the damage inflicted by decades of civil war and on-again, off-again insurgencies... MORE

Last spring (April 2019), after almost 20 years of Russian lobbying, a subgroup of the United Nations Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf declared that much of the Arctic seabed is an extension of Russia’s land mass and thus a potential exclusion zone.... MORE

Russia held its annual Grom (Thunder) strategic nuclear forces exercise on October 15–17 (see EDM, October 21, 22). About 12,000 service personnel; 213 launchers of the Strategic Missile Forces; up to 105 aircraft, including five strategic missile carriers; as many as 15 surface ships; 5... MORE

While international financial organizations have been warning about a global economic slowdown and revising growth forecasts downwards, Ukraine has been among the few economies for which forecasts were revised upward recently. The World Bank (WB) now expects that Ukraine will grow by 3.4 percent this... MORE

The Russia-Africa Summit and Economic Forum, held in Sochi on October 23–24, is the first regional event of such magnitude ever hosted by the Russian Federation. While the main goals set forth by the Kremlin were political and economic (e.g., to double the current volume... MORE

The memorandum of understanding on Syria signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, in Sochi, on October 22, was seen as a triumph in Moscow (see EDM, October 24); but the jubilation evaporated in a matter of days. The Kremlin... MORE

In May 2018, the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine placed Russian billionaire and “aluminum magnate” Oleg Deripaska, who is close to Russian President Vladimir Putin, as well as three companies related to him (United Company RUSAL and its Moscow- and Cyprus-based branches, Judson... MORE

It has only recently become clear to analysts in the United States that Russia is playing a big role in Latin America to destabilize Washington’s alliance system and threaten US interests. Despite the costs involved in sustaining Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua, Russia’s three main “proxies”... MORE

President Vladimir Putin views Africa not as an end in itself, even when he and Russia obviously benefit directly (Rosbalt, January 19; see EDM, October 15), but rather as a battlefield in his renewed cold war against the West. This Soviet-style approach contains within it... MORE