The summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Vilnius, Lithuania, on July 11 and 12 will likely not produce any sensational joint decisions; it is set, nevertheless, to signify a major step in reconfiguring and reinforcing the European security system. Russia’s aggression against Ukraine has shaken this system badly, and NATO, which used… Read more »
Search Results for: Open
Failures of Putin Regime Distort Russian Political Perspectives
Questions about the drivers, participants and consequences of the Wagner Group mutiny on June 23 and 24 are set to remain unanswered as the Russian leadership finds it necessary to close that shocking page.
Mutiny Undercuts Russian Intrigues in the Global South
The weekend mutiny of the Wagner Group, pathetic as it may look in hindsight, is certain to affect Russia’s ability to sustain its aggression against Ukraine and to repel the ongoing Ukrainian counteroffensive. But it will also resonate in a much wider sense.
Queer Paradoxes after the Pride Terror Attack
Earlier this week, my partner bought some rainbow-coloured yarn. While we queued at the till, a mother in front of us pointed at our yarn and said to her child: Look! Just like you! A small voice addressing an enormous issue. Being queer feels different this year and I’ll explain why.
Russia Stays on the Course of Economic Delusion and Military Attrition
The summer economic forum in St. Petersburg used to be a vanity fair of Russian opulence and corruption. But last week’s modest, if not frugal, event was rather an exercise in self-reassurance of sustainable stagnation.
The Counteroffensive, the Dam and the Proliferation of ‘Peace Plans’
The protracted deadlock in the trenches of the war in Ukraine is giving way to high-intensity battles, and this escalation instantly generates widespread international resonance, in which expectations of a Ukrainian victory are mixed with concerns about a Russian defeat. Now, the initiative is clearly with the Ukrainian forces, which, from June 5, started a… Read more »
Ukraine Takes the War Deep Into Russia
Sun Tzu, the great Chinese military philosopher, was rarely studied in Soviet military academies, but the Ukrainian high command — seeking to “win first and start fighting after” — appears to be taking a page out of his treatise, The Art of War. Naturally, the intentions for a spring offensive have now become a plan for… Read more »
Three Russian Discourses and Significant Silence on the War in Ukraine
The noise of jingoist propaganda and anti-Western hysteria emanating from Moscow is not as monotonous as it often seems, and the variations expose significant differences between and within Russian elite groups. Recent military setbacks, such as the destruction of a mixed air group over the Bryansk region on May 13 and the incursion of a… Read more »
Summit in Hiroshima Charts Ending for War in Ukraine
From May 19 to 21, Japan hosted the most recent meeting of the seven heads of state (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States) as well as the European Union in the so-called G7 format. Overall, the key point on the agenda was certainly strengthening the unity of democratic states… Read more »
Central Asian Leaders Opted to Attend Curtailed Parade in Moscow
The Victory Day celebrated on May 9 is a hugely important and emotionally loaded holiday for the majority of Russians and Ukrainians, Kazakhs and Uzbeks, whose grandfathers fought together and defeated Nazi Germany back in 1945. In Russia, this solemn Remembrance Day was gradually converted by all-pervasive propaganda into a manifestation of militarism and aggressive… Read more »