Carnegie Moscow Center
The danger for the EU in the rapprochement between Russia and China lies in the fortification of the Russian economy against sanctions and in an increased assertiveness for China.
Syrian jihad will not be replicated by Central Asian combatants returning home, but fundamentalist ideals are long-established in this region and will not go away.
Eight months of continuous presidential vacuum is bad news for the future of Lebanon’s democracy and stability.
Currently, Russia and Saudi Arabia are neither friends nor foes, and the status of bilateral relations and their future remain obscure. This, in turn, is clearly reflected in the polyphony of views on Saudi Arabia existing in Russian society.
Recently the normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations has drawn the attention of both Turkish and world media. However, current activities around the “Armenian question” failed to create solid ground for real compromise between the two states.
Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev has managed to use the Ukraine crisis as a sort of stepping stone to elevate his international profile and Kazakhstan’s geopolitical status.
The Ukraine crisis has had an increasingly negative effect on Russia’s relations with Belarus and Kazakhstan, its closest allies and partners in the Customs Union and Eurasian Union.
After the initial shock the Ukrainian crisis brought, Central Asian states have gradually come to the conclusion that they should continue dealing with Russia. Still, none of these states are prepared to be totally controlled by Russia.
Many are talking about Russia’s pivot eastward, but is it working? Eurasia Outlook posed the question to some leading experts in the field in order to gather some thoughts about the policy’s effectiveness.
Many in Russia believe that the EU sanctions appeared as a result of the Ukrainian conflict and pressure from Washington. In fact, the reasons for the current deterioration in Russia’s relations with Europe are far more profound. But this does not mean that another—European—front in Russia’s confrontation with the West has now been opened.