 RFE/RL Headlines 10/19/2009 5:20:48 PM A daily digest of the English-language news and analysis written by the staff of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty |
| News  EU, Russia Press On With Partnership The European Union's relations with Russia appear to have returned to business as usual -- except that there's not much business in evidence. The verdict after EU-Russia talks in Brussels is that real cooperation on most substantive issues has come to a virtual standstill. More  Election Fraud Report Said To Point To Afghan Runoff A UN-backed panel investigating complaints of fraud in Afghanistan's August presidential election has released its final decisions, reportedly throwing away enough votes to bring incumbent President Hamid Karzai's vote tally below 50 percent and force a second-round runoff. More  Tehran Threatens To Retaliate For Bombings Iran has threatened to "retaliate" against the U.S. and Britain for their part in an attack that killed at least 42 people in southeastern Iran. Tehran says intelligence agencies from the two countries and Pakistan have links to the group the Iranians say carried out the attack on the elite Revolutionary Guards. More  Tajikistan Says Kills Four Islamist Militants Tajikistan's security forces have killed four Taliban-linked Islamist militants and captured one in a gunfight, the Central Asian state's Interior Ministry said. More  Armenia Optimistic On Power Deal With Turkey Armenia hopes to boost its energy cooperation with Turkey in the wake of warming relations between Ankara and Yerevan, RFE/RL's Armenian Service reports. More  Russian Black Sea Fleet Objects To Ukrainian Checks Russian Black Sea Fleet commanders have raised objections to spot checks of their military vehicles by Ukrainian traffic police, RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service reports. More  EU Plans Economic Aid To Armenia The European Union has announced plans to provide Armenia with economic assistance, RFE/RL's Armenian Service reports. More Kyrgyz border guards are continuing their search for armed insurgents who entered Kyrgyz territory from neighboring Tajikistan, RFE/RL's Kyrgyz Service reports. More  Moldovan Officials Identify Suspect In Grenade Attack Moldovan authorities say they have identified the man responsible for a grenade attack that injured 40 people at an open-air concert in downtown Chisinau on October 14, RFE/RL's Moldovan Service reports. More  Former Kazakh Minister Convicted Of Corruption Former Kazakh Ecology Minister Nurlan Iskakov has been sentenced to four years in jail after being found guilty of corruption by an Astana court, RFE/RL's Kazakh Service reports. More  Armenian PM Accuses Transport Ministry Of Corruption Armenian Prime Minister Tigran Sarkisian has accused the Transport Ministry of corruption in its use of road funds, RFE/RL's Armenian Service reports. More  Saakashvili Is Ready For His Close-Up In March, Russian television aired “Olympius Inferno,” a made-for-TV thriller based on the first days of the Russian-Georgian war of August 2008. That is, based on the Kremlin’s version of the start of the war. Now Hollywood is taking a crack at the subject, RFE/RL's Russian and Georgian services report. More  'Only Idiots Didn't Listen' Romanian-born author Herta Mueller, who won the 2009 Nobel Prize for literature, grew up under dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. So when she visited the Frankfurt Book Fair last week, she offered her support to Chinese dissident writers Bei Ling and Zhong Weiguang. She also found time to speak up for the importance of free access to information. More  Daghestan's Moscow Representative Denies Advocating Death Squads Gadji Makhachev, who is Daghestan's formal representative in Moscow, issued a statement on October 18 distancing himself from comments he was quoted as having made at a roundtable discussion in Moscow two days earlier of the repeated incursions into Daghestan by Chechen militants in the summer of 1999. More  ‘Without Freedom, I Don’t Exist’ Blogger Neveshte bar bad (Written on the wind) writes about his attachment to his green wristband, which for him is a symbol of commitment to freedom. More  Remembering Friends Who Remain Behind Bars Blogger Haminjuri (Just like that) writes about his friends who remain in jail after being arrested in the postelection crackdown. More  A Memorable Iftar Blogger Muslim Photographer recounts how he met Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei three years ago and took his picture at an Iftar ceremony, the evening meal that breaks the daily fast during Ramadan. More  Pipeline Politics Will the Nabucco pipeline become a casualty of the Turkish-Armenian rapprochement? Azerbaijan's president says that Turkey pays too little for its gas and that Baku would seek alternative routes. If he's not just bluffing, analysts say it could be the death knell for the Western-backed project and provide a big boost to Russia's South Stream. More  Western Region Could Decide Presidential Vote Ukraine's three-month election campaign has begun, after what is widely seen as five years of missed opportunities under incumbent President Viktor Yushchenko. Past presidential elections have been a contest for control of the "swing" region of central Ukraine. For the first time, western Ukraine will play a strategic role in deciding the winner. More  Turkish-Armenian Deal Leaves Unanswered Questions Last weekend's agreement between Turkey and Armenia to establish diplomatic relations has been hailed around the world as an important breakthrough. But the accord is only the first step on a long road toward full reconciliation, which still faces major obstacles. More  Terror Expert Discusses Taliban, Al-Qaeda Funding Although the Taliban is growing rich from the drug trade in Afghanistan, some officials, including U.S. Assistant Treasury Secretary for Terrorist Financing David Cohen, say Al-Qaeda's leadership has recently fallen on hard times financially. RFE/RL's Washington correspondent Andrew F. Tully in spoke about this with New York-based Rachel Ehrenfeld, a prolific author who specializes in terrorism and financial corruption. More  Details Emerge About Condemned Detainees In Iran The Iranian establishment seems determined to end the postelection crisis and prevent further protests by issuing harsh sentences, including death sentences, for detainees put on trial over the unrest. Evidence has emerged suggesting three of the four people believed to have been sentenced to death for their role in the postelection unrest were, in fact, arrested before the June 12 vote. More  Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact Still Divides Europe Seventy years after the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the role the accord played in triggering World War II and dividing Europe remains the subject of intense debate. Opinion is split even among academics and politicians who agree throwing light on Soviet crimes is an essential part of healing Europe's historical wounds. More  Dmitry Medvedev's Theater Of The Absurd The parties that stormed out of the Russian State Duma in protest last week cannot possibly have believed that Dmitry Medvedev would respond any differently than Vladimir Putin would have. In the eighteen months he has been in power, Medvedev has not made a single statement that required courage, or taken a single step that could have upset the status quo. More  The Rise And Fall (And Rise?) Of Arseniy Yatsenyuk Arseniy Yatsenyuk, the leader of the newly created Front for Change, brought a breath of fresh air to Ukraine’s political scene, dominated by the infighting of the main personalities. But his rapid rise stopped suddenly as his pro-Russian and isolationist strategy fell flat with the Ukrainian public. More |
