In the new Netflix hit series The Diplomat, a fictional UK prime minister accurately ticks through the ways Russian President Vladimir Putin has been punished for his invasion of Ukraine: “We sanctioned Russian debt, embargoed their oil, and banned them from SWIFT.” In the fifteen months since Russia’s full-scale invasion …

As Russia’s unjustified war against Ukraine continues, a critical question will be whether and how NATO should enhance its support for Ukraine at its July summit in Vilnius, Lithuania. NATO has long stated that Ukraine will—eventually—become a member of the alliance, but a key decision for NATO will be how …

The arrest of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich in March was the first time a Western journalist had been held on espionage charges in post-Soviet Russia — but it opened a floodgate of memories for Nicholas Daniloff. Daniloff was working as a journalist in the Soviet Union in 1986 …

An attack by an armed group on a Russian region bordering Ukraine earlier this week has been met with a mixture of shock, anger and indifference, according to six interviews with locals conducted by The Moscow Times. The Belgorod region, which lies across the border from Ukraine’s second-largest city Kharkiv, …

The head of Russia’s Belgorod region which borders Ukraine, claimed Monday that a Ukrainian “sabotage group” had infiltrated the region, while anti-Kremlin Russians fighting alongside Ukraine’s forces appeared to take responsibility. “A VSU [armed forces of Ukraine] sabotage group entered the territory of Grayvoron district,” Belgorod Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote …

Is the region becoming the next battleground for great power competition? Not if Central Asian states have anything to say about it. As the Group of Seven met at the end of last week in Hiroshima, Japan, China organized a summit with Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, marking a …

The Georgian Dream’s gains from rapprochement with Moscow are quite nebulous, while the risks are very real. But the party itself, which has made a number of unforced errors lately, may see things differently.Russian President Vladimir Putin’s surprise move to scrap visa requirements for Georgian nationals and resume direct flights …

Even if Georgia knew nothing about Russia’s decision beforehand, the current arrangement suits both the Kremlin and official Tbilisi: it helps Georgian Dream to hold on to power, while Russia is building on barely existent ties with Georgia that may lead to greater gains for Moscow in the future.Russian President …

The Uzbek regime is losing stability because its objectives increasingly diverge from the public expectations that President Mirziyoyev himself worked to create.Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev finds himself in something of a conundrum. Having positioned himself as a reformer, he is now finding that grassroots demand for change is impeding his …

Putin’s plan is to wait out what he sees as inevitable changes in the West and Ukraine. These days, however, Russia’s elites are liable to see defeatism in inaction.Nothing is happening in Russia. At least, that’s the impression given by Vladimir Putin over the past six months. On some level, …