Free Republic

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has arrived in Poland on a one-day visit aimed at improving relations between the two countries.

LONDON, October 4, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- Companies from all over the world head to the London Stock Exchange when they need to attract international investment and raise development capital. Firms from Russia and elsewhere in the CIS are among the latest to head to London to launch initial public offerings (IPOs) -- their first sale of stock to the public.

On the eastern border of the Black Sea adjacent to the Caucasus Mountain range rests a country of 5 million people on a land rich in history, agriculture, literature, and SUPERB WINE.......the Republic of Georgia. Formerly a member of the Soviet Union, Georgia has a long history of winemaking. In fact, many people believe that the word "wine" is of Georgian origin. Ancient wine vessels dating back to 5000 B.C., recently unearthed by scientists, offer evidence to support this theory. Georgia's moderate climate and moist air, influenced by the Black Sea, provide the best conditions for vine culturing. This small...

President Vladimir Putin has warned Georgia not to use the "language of provocation and blackmail" against Russia in a speech in parliament. The Duma went on to vote overwhelmingly for a motion echoing Mr Putin's condemnation of "anti-Russian" and "anti-democratic" policies in Tbilisi. Tension rose in the past week when Georgia detained, then released, four Russian army officers for spying. Russia has imposed a travel and postal ban between the two countries. "I would not advise anyone to talk to Russia in the language of provocation and blackmail," Mr Putin said in the Duma. "I am talking about Georgia here."...

BRUSSELS, October 4, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- EU High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy Javier Solana today acknowledged that Kosovo's campaign for independence could set a precedent for Georgia's breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Solana also said the European Union could not meet a request made by Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili for peacekeepers, but that Brussels is actively trying to "build confidence" between Moscow and Tbilisi. Solana told the European Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee in Brussels today that during a recent phone conversation, Saakashvili had confessed to "tremendous worry" about the possible consequences that ongoing UN-sponsored Kosovo...

PRAGUE, October 2, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- The recent reburial of the remains of Maria Fyodorovna, the Danish princess who married the future Aleksandr III of Russia in 1866, is the latest episode in a long-standing effort to cultivate the idea of restoring the monarchy in Russia. The idea gained currency under President Boris Yeltsin in 1997, when his close circle, alarmed by the Russian president's ailing health, started to think about a possible successor. Some of them turned their attention to the living descendents of the Romanov dynasty. That same year, renovation work began at the Kremlin to restore the...

Four Russian officers detained in Georgia have been charged with spying, Georgian officials have said. A court in Tbilisi ordered all four officers to be detained for two months pending investigations. Russia has recalled its ambassador to Tbilisi after Wednesday's arrests and has begun a partial evacuation of its staff from Georgia.

On Friday, President Bush will welcome Nursultan Nazarbaev, the leader of Kazakhstan, to the White House. Kazakhstan is the pivotal country in the heart of Eurasia, due to its vast mineral resources, a solid track record of economic growth, and geopolitical location between China and Russia. These days, Washington is short of friends, especially Islamic and oil-rich ones, so every such country counts. Kazakhstan has the largest oil and gas reserves in the Caspian Sea basin, and is producing 1.5 million barrels of oil a day today. It is projected to produce 2.5-3.5 million barrels of oil a day by...

Russia has ordered a partial withdrawal of officials and their families in Georgia in a worsening row over the arrest of Russian officers there. The Russian ambassador would also leave Tbilisi, said the foreign ministry. It follows Wednesday's arrests of five Russian military personnel accused by Tbilisi of spying. Moscow is demanding their immediate release. Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili denounced the Russian reaction to the arrests as "hysteria". The already tense relations between the two countries have deteriorated over the past week, correspondents say.

President Vladimir Putin will face tough questions over Russia's review of foreign energy contracts and attempt to acquire a bigger stake in EADS when he meets with French President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Angela Merkel at a summit in France this weekend. The three leaders are also due to discuss Russia's evolving relationship with the European Union and to try and hammer out a common approach toward Iran's nuclear program. Putin will kick off his visit Friday by meeting Chirac in Paris, where the two leaders are expected to discuss a wide range of issues, including transportation and trade,...

The suggestion to form a Turkish commonwealth among Turkic-speaking countries voiced at the recent gathering of leaders of Turkic states in Turkey’s seaside resort city of Antalya appears to reflect Ankara’s desire to strengthen its economic and political positions in Eurasia. Moscow should not treat Turkey’s growing geopolitical ambitions lightly, some Russian analysts say. On September 18-20, the 10th Turkic States and Communities’ Friendship and Cooperation Congress took place at the posh hotel complex on Turkey’s Mediterranean coast. Organized by the Turkish Cooperation and Development Agency (TIKA), the Turkic Convention brought together top policymakers from Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan,...

RIGA, August 16, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- August 21 marks the 15th anniversary of Latvia declaring full independence from the Soviet Union, after the failed coup attempt in Moscow a few days earlier. Since then Latvia has gone from strength to strength, joining the European Union and NATO in 2004. "June 17, 1940, the Soviets came in, and in 1941, the Germans came in and pushed back the Soviets," says Oskars Gruzins, a young guide at the Museum of Occupation in the heart of old Riga, as he shows tourists a large map of Latvia. "After the Germans were defeated, the...

Four Russian mountaineers have gone missing in Pakistan on the world's second highest mountain, K2.

MOSCOW, August 14 (RIA Novosti) - International rating agency Fitch said Monday that Russia's move to cut oil supplies to a major Lithuanian refinery could be political. After an accident on the Druzhba pipeline in western Russia in July, crude supplies to Mazeikiu Nafta were interrupted, and have not been fully resumed. "If supplies of Russian crude oil by pipeline to MN are not resumed within the next few weeks, this could lead one to conclude that political rather than technical reasons are to blame for the supply disruption, as the Lithuanian refinery was recently acquired by Polish PKN and...

KIEV, August 11 (RIA Novosti) - Ukraine's new prime minister said Friday that granting Russian the status of an official language in the country was impossible under current conditions. Viktor Yanukovych, speaking in Ukraine's Russian-speaking Crimea, said such a decision could be made by the constitutional majority in the Ukrainian parliament or through nationwide referendum. "Both of these steps are unrealistic at the current stage," he said, as his supporters would not be able to gain a constitutional majority in the Supreme Rada, and referendums are "a procedure controlled by the president." Yanukovych said Ukraine needed a law "that would...

KIEV, Ukraine – Chief Rabbi of Ukraine Azriel Chaikin and the Israeli Ambassador to Ukraine Naomi Ben-Ami met with the leader of the Ukrainian Cossacks Anatoliy Schevchenko and the General Judge of Cossacks Igor Kozlovsky. At this meeting, the Cossack leaders assured the Chief Rabbi of Ukraine and the Israeli Ambassador of their support of Israel as it combats terrorism. As a dean of a local higher-education institution, Mr. Schevchenko said his teaching staff was doing everything possible to explain to their students the importance of supporting Israel as well as the need to fight against anti-Semitism and national and...

Rafiq Qori Kamoluddin, the prominent ethnic Uzbek religious leader who was killed during a security raid in southern Kyrgyzstan on August 6, is not the first imam to have been targeted by law-enforcement agencies in the region. Several other Uzbek imams have been persecuted before. But he is the first to have been targeted by both Kyrgyz and Uzbek security services. Independent observers say the violent death of an Islamic leader known for his tolerance toward radical worshipers highlights increasing Kyrgyz-Uzbek cooperation to fight religious dissent.

ROMA, August 8, 2006 – Coming on the heel of one another, a book and an essay in “Foreign Affairs” by Vali Nasr, a report by Peter Waldman in “The Wall Street Journal” and an editorial in Italian daily “la Repubblica” by Khaled Fouad Allam are drawing attention to an historical shift now underway in the Islamic world: the Shia revival. “The Shia revival” is in point of fact the title of Vali Nasr’s book on the issue. Born in Iran, the 46-year-old scholar is the son of another well-known expert on Islam from an important family that can trade...

PRAGUE, August 7, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- A prominent religious leader known for allowing Islamic radicals to pray alongside other worshippers at his mosque in southern Kyrgyzstan has been killed in a security raid. Muhammadrafiq Kamalov -- also known as Rafiq Qori Kamoluddin -- had defended his practice of allowing suspected members of the banned Hizb ut-Tahrir to worship at his mosque the town of Kara-Suu. Muslims should pray for the "misguided" rather than turn them away, he said. But authorities are describing Kamoluddin in death as a member of an Islamist terror group.

Georgia stopped Thursday the electric energy import from Russia and will need no our energy even in the abstract starting from March 2007. As to the gas dependency, it will end even sooner, in late 2006. It was Georgian Deputy Energy Minister Achil Nikolaishvili that told Interfax about stopping import deliveries of electric energy via Kavkasioni power line August 2. Kavkasioni delivers no more than 100MW to Georgia in summer. After rebuilding Ingur Hydroelectric Power Station and putting in operation its three units, the power grid of the country got additional 600 MW in generating capacity, said officials of Georgian...