February 17:
Russia's government is bracing for the worst. UPI reports that a new forecast from the Russian Economy Ministry has predicted a period of protracted economic decline and retraction from world markets. "Gross domestic product is expected to contract by 3 percent amid persistently strong geopolitical risks and the presumption that average annual oil prices will equal $50 per barrel," the Ministry has outlined in a new official document made available to the press. "Forecasts show that the Russian economy will enter a phase of a prolonged decline in 2015."
February 18:
The Kremlin has picked a curious choice to head its delegation to the White House Summit on Countering Violent Extremism. Reuters reports that Alexander Bortnikov, the head of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), is leading the official delegation. The FSB chief "will inform the participants of the forum about the national system to counter extremism that is functioning in the Russian Federation, stressing the importance of the role of the state in countering the ideology of terrorism," the agency said in an official statement.
February 19:
Just days after the signing of a new ceasefire agreement, the truce between Moscow and Kyiv is fraying amid renewed fighting in Ukraine's east. According to the Washington Post, the flash point is now the town of Debaltseve, a strategic transport hub located in Ukraine's Donetsk Oblast.
Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko has responded to the renewed violence by asking for United Nations peacekeepers to be deployed along the country's common border with Russia. Russian officials, however, have rejected the notion, and warned that such a move would imperil the recent ceasefire.
February 20:
The Atlantic Alliance must brace for a reinvigorated military challenge from Russia, a top NATO general has warned. The Financial Times cites Sir Adrian Bradshaw, the British general who is second-in-command of NATO forces in Europe, as saying that the security bloc must be prepared for a large-scale Russian military assault on Eastern Europe. "Russia might believe the large-scale conventional forces she has shown she can generate at very short notice - as we saw in the snap exercises that preceded the takeover of Crimea - could in future not only be used for intimidation and coercion, but to seize Nato territory," Sir Adrian told an audience at the Royal United Services Institute in London.
February 22:
Broad swathes of the North Caucasus and Southern Russia are emptying of people, writes Russia expert Paul Goble. In his Window on Eurasia blog, Goble notes a recent Russian media report that "there are now 171 dead villages in the North Caucasus Federal district and 80 more in which there are ten or fewer residents and that in the neighboring South Russian Federal District, the corresponding figures are 140 and 270."
"As elsewhere in the Russian Federation," Goble writes, "people are leaving rural areas in the North Caucasus and adjoining areas, leaving villages deserted or half-deserted, undercutting prospects for agricultural growth, and changing the security situation in many places. Indeed, in many of these places, the only things that remain are cemeteries."
February 23:
As part of its deepening defense relationship with Iran, Russia has proffered new missile systems to the Iranian regime. Iran's PressTV reports that Russia has offered the Islamic Republic its "latest" anti-aircraft system, the Antey-2500. The system is intended as a replacement for the S-300 batteries that the Kremlin promised Tehran several years ago, but didn't deliver as a result of Western pressure. The Iranian government is now said to be considering the offer.
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