Robert Coalson worked as a correspondent for RFE/RL from 2002 to 2024.
Russia's new law restoring the direct election of regional executive-branch heads comes into effect on June 1. In Tatarstan, the process has become part of a larger tug-of-war with Moscow over basic issues of federalism.
Despite increasingly vociferous objections from Russia, this weekend's NATO summit will announce the next steps in European missile defense, including an "interim capability" that is being hailed as the first step toward fully protecting NATO populations from limited missile attacks.
Warsaw's feel-good effort to jointly host the Euro 2012 soccer championships with its eastern neighbor has left it in a difficult position, as European officials announce plans to boycott matches on Ukrainian soil to protest the treatment of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.
Attempts by young Serbian and Kosovar artists to bridge the gap between their countries and communities are being thwarted due to lingering fears and entrenched animosities.
During a visit to a major auto plant in Tolyatti, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced that in the near future all cars purchased with state funds would have to be produced within the Russia-Belarus-Kazakhstan common economic space. He has made similar statements in the past, but Russian officials continue to show a preference for foreign-made Mercedes, BMWs, Audis, and Land Rovers.
Economists and development experts are meeting at the United Nations in New York to discuss whether improving happiness is just as important as increasing gross national product (GNP) for developing countries.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine gave up their Soviet-legacy nuclear weapons. But what did they get in return and how do they feel about that decision now?
Sergei Nazarov was taken from a Kazan jail to a hospital, where he died the next day -- but not before telling doctors he had been tortured by police. All too often, such cases get covered up or ignored in Russia, but this one seems to be different.
Lawmakers in Moldova, spurred by several high-profile cases of pedophilia in recent years, have adopted a law mandating "chemical castration" for anyone convicted of committing a sexual crime against a child younger than 15. RFE/RL takes a look at the problem of sexual tourism and sexual exploitation in Moldova.
RFE/RL talk-show host and investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova says she will not be intimidated by an anonymous attempt to blackmail her into silence after intimate photographs are circulated and she's told to "behave."
The nomination of 72-year-old former East German anticommunist activist Joachim Gauck to be the next president of Germany came as a surprise -- not least to Gauck himself.
It is as predictable as snow in a Russian winter. When Moscow has a tussle with one of its neighbors, Russian health officials suddenly discover something wrong with that country's exports.
During the recent campaign to lead the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia, former Education Minister Alla Dzhioyeva has emerged as the unlikely focal point of an even more unlikely pro-democracy movement.
The breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia has just held the first round of its presidential election, while the breakaway Moldovan region of Transdniester will hold its own presidential poll next month. In both cases, it appears Moscow wants to weaken the grip of entrenched political elites.
With the conviction in the United States of arms dealer Viktor Bout on November 2, the Russian government has stepped up its protests and vowed to secure Bout's return to Russia.
Russia has successfully launched the 24th satellite of its Glonass satellite navigation system, giving the high-profile project the full constellation needed for global coverage. It's been a rocky road for the system, which was adopted in the early 2000s as a showcase for Russia's modernization.
Talks on Moldova's Transdniester conflict are set to resume after being suspended for more than five years. RFE/RL looks at the significance of the resumption of the talks and the serious issues that remain unresolved.
Three years after the August 2008 war with Russia that led to Georgia's defeat and Moscow's recognition of the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the situation on the ground is a stalemate and leading figures in Georgia are taking a surprisingly long-term view of the situation.
About 10 percent of the graduating students in the Gagauz Autonomous Region of Moldova failed their final exams in Romanian language and literature this year. The poor showing sent tremors through the fault lines separating the tiny Gagauz minority from the rest of the country.
Opposition protesters in Belarus have impressed the world for weeks now as they come up with one imaginative way after another to demonstrate against the regime of President Alyaksandr Lukashenka. Now it is the turn of the government to impress with its creativity, producing draft legislation that would make it illegal for people to gather "for a previously planned action or inaction."
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