This weekend, the Union State of Russia and Belarus marks its 20th anniversary, which the authorities decided to celebrate with a supposedly historical meeting. Despite the prolonged history of the project, the Union State has never become a shadow of what it was meant to become upon its establishment.

Why should we not care about the Confederacy between Russia and Belarus?

The scale of repression in Russia is now more serious and terrifying than in 2012. At the same time, the Russian public has become more mature and fearless. Independent groups of lawyers provide free legal advice, journalists and activists defend human rights, and various crowdfunding campaigns provide financial assistance to those detained. As a result, prisoners feel encouraged even when they face the brutality of the system.

This summer was marked with a series of unprecedented political protests in Moscow, which started on June 12th and finished on September 29th. First, Russian citizens demanded justice for investigative journalist, Ivan Golunov, who was absurdly charged with the possession of an illegal substance with intent to distribute. Golunov was released days after the charges as a result of pressure from journalists, human rights activists and protesters on the streets of Moscow.

How can we understand how Joseph Stalin, one of history’s most notorious dictators, is not only tolerated, but oftentimes defended in present-day Russia? Is this a failure of history? Who or what is fanning the flames of this modern Stalin-cult?

Recent months have witnessed some important anniversaries in the history of the Second World War. On January 27th 2018, the city of St Petersburg, formerly Leningrad, celebrated the 75th anniversary of the end of the Siege of Leningrad. The Nazi siege of the city, which lasted some 900 days, intended to starve the city out of existence. Though ultimately unsuccessful, over one million of the city’s residents died as a result, whilst many more experienced over two years of pain and suffering.

This episode launches a special series on security, Georgia and the Black Sea region.

This episode of Talk Eastern Europe takes a closer look at the current state of Russia-China relations.

An interview with Ilia Darchiashvili, the Ambassador of the Republic of Georgia to Poland. Interviewer Daniel Gleichgewicht

Conflicting official statements about the Arkhangelsk explosion and strategic information control was reminiscent of a bygone era.

Green European Journal interviews Rebecca Harms, a former Member of the European Parliament for Alliance '90/The Greens.

Fifteen years on, the siege of School No. 1 is shrouded in the conspiracy theories that often arise from mass trauma.

How Russia’s religious hierarchs reject the new Orthodox Church of Ukraine.

Turkey’s policy in the Black Sea, which mainly aims to deter NATO’s presence in the region, has diminished its overall role, making it more vulnerable to Russia’s growing influence. Russian’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 was a clear signal that the Black Sea is gradually becoming a Russian lake, upsetting the equilibrium that has been in place for nearly a century.

Despite centuries of political and military conflicts and other power dynamics around the Black Sea, there has never been a period in history when a common conception of the Black Sea region existed – not even among the littoral states. Accordingly, the Black Sea region has gradually evolved into a unit of analysis, a sort of framework under which certain power dynamics are analysed by different scholars and policy-makers.