Islamic State May Threaten Russia's Caucasus

BBC AMERICA: The head of Russia's Security Council has identified Islamic State (IS) as the greatest threat to world peace and security, and it seems the danger could be getting closer to home.

The militant Islamist group has proclaimed the establishment of a wilayaat, or province, in Russia's mainly-Muslim North Caucasus, suggesting it may be gaining the upper hand in a battle for control over radical forces there.

The statement follows an anonymous audio message posted online pledging allegiance to IS on behalf of militants in four regions. » | Sarah Rainsford, BBC News, Moscow | Tuesday, June 30, 2015

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Russia’s Caucasus: Breeding Ground for Terror
TIME: (MOSCOW) — Militants from Chechnya and other restive regions in Russia’s volatile North Caucasus have targeted Moscow and other areas with bombings and hostage-takings, but the allegations of involvement in the Boston Marathon explosions would mark the first time they had conducted a terror attack in the West.

The conflict in Chechnya began in 1994 as a separatist war, but quickly morphed into an Islamic insurgency whose adepts vow to carve out an independent Islamic state in the Caucasus.

Russian troops withdrew from Chechnya in 1996 after the first Chechen war, leaving it de-facto independent and largely lawless, but then rolled back three years later following apartment building explosions in Moscow and other cities blamed on the rebels. » | Associated Press | Friday, April 19, 2013

Russian Ski Resort Plan Faces Islamist Terror Threat

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Russia's grand plan to revitalise its poverty-stricken southern flank by building a series of ski resorts there is one that has already attracted the wrath of Islamist terrorists.

In February, a group of masked gunmen stopped a minibus carrying skiers in the internal republic of Kabardino-Balkaria and shot dead three tourists from Moscow in cold blood. A ski lift was bombed soon afterwards and police later defused a series of car bombs in the area.

The terrorists, who are fighting to establish an Islamist Caliphate across southern Russia, openly said they viewed tourists as a legitimate target. For them, the entire North Caucasus area is a war zone and ethnic Russians are an occupying force that they hope to drive out.

The Kremlin's response to the murders was typically robust. Special Forces were sent into the mountainous region to hunt the gunmen and were reported to have shot dead at least some of the group. » | Andrew Osborn, Moscow | Friday, May 27, 2011

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: France to help Russia build ski resorts in North Caucases: France will help Russia with its ambitious plan to create a constellation of ski resorts in the North Caucasus, a poor region plagued by insurgent violence. » | Friday, May 27, 2011

Russia Plans Ski Resorts on Slopes of Caucasus
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: For any Russian worth his caviar there is only one place to be seen in winter.

Alpine resorts such as Courchevel are a magnet for fur-hatted men and women in Chanel ski suits, its pistes signposted in Cyrillic script and its boutiques offering wealthy oligarchs must-have diamond-encrusted skis.

But now an ambitious consortium of developers is hoping to lure Russian and European skiers to a new winter playground – far from the softly twinkling lights of traditional Alpine villages.

They are to construct a cluster of five ski resorts in the war-torn North Caucasus, stretching across southern Russia from the Black Sea in the west to the Caspian Sea in the east, and challenging the widely-held belief that the area is dangerous and out of bounds. The planners also want to upgrade Mineralnye Vody airport for international flights, putting it within four hours' flying time of Britain.

The five resorts – Lagonaki, Arkhyz, Mount Elbrus, Mamison and Matlas – will be strung out across a mountain range which has seen fierce fighting with Georgia, given refuge to Islamic militants, and been plagued by regular kidnappings, bombings and murders.

Yet this week in the picture-postcard Swiss ski resort of Davos, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will formally unveil the plan for the network of ski resorts, named Peak 5642 after Mt Elbrus, the highest mountain in the Caucasus at 18,442ft (5,642 metres) – some 2,660 higher than Alps' Mont Blanc. » | Harriet Alexander | Sunday, January 23, 2011

Bin Laden Dead, Global Terrorism Alive

Russia's Unruly North Caucasus: Islam Inflamed
THE ECONOMIST: Muslim fundamentalism is on the rise in the north Caucasus. To stop it, Russian policy must change

THE world is fearful of Islam’s rising influence in Afghanistan, Pakistan and across the newly restive Arab world. But it has barely noticed what is happening in Russia’s troubled north Caucasus. After two decades of political and military failure in this violent part of the world, the government in Moscow is losing its legitimacy there, and fundamentalist Islam, which had no purchase in Soviet days, has taken hold.

The north Caucasus may take up only a small space on the map, but it looms large for Russia. The region has often decisively influenced the course of Russia’s own development. Boris Yeltsin’s decision to send in troops to stop Chechnya’s march towards independence helped to weaken Russia’s fledgling democracy in the mid-1990s. Vladimir Putin’s vow to rub out Chechen rebels “in the shithouse” helped to propel him into the presidency. Eleven years on, the north Caucasus is still one of Russia’s biggest headaches. Terrorist attacks, like the bombing at Domodedovo airport in January, have become almost commonplace. In its largely unreported fighting in the north Caucasus, Russia is suffering as many losses every year as Britain has lost in ten years in Afghanistan. » | Leaders | Thursday, April 07, 2011

Russia's Bitter Harvest
LOS ANGELES TIMES: As the Moscow bombings remind, the simmering insurgency and brutal crackdown in the Caucasus have left a landscape of damaged women, some all too ready to spread their pain to Russia's heartland.

Mariyam Sharipova, one of the two women who carried out the attack in Moscow, is seen in a photo on the cellphone of her mother, Patimat Magomedova. (April 12, 2010) Photograph: Los Angeles Times
Reporting from Balakhani, Russia
The last time Patimat Magomedova saw her daughter, she was puttering around the house, manicuring her nails and using henna to dye her hair bright red.

It's high time we take care of the garden, the mother remembers Mariyam Sharipova saying that Friday. Let's plant raspberries, cucumbers, greens. And we have to do something about the kitchen, maybe get some pretty new dishes.

By evening, the young woman had vanished from the house in this remote mountain village in the Russian republic of Dagestan. Magomedova didn't see her daughter's face again until somebody showed her a photograph of a decapitated head. At that moment, she said, "I knew there was no mistake."

Sharipova, 27, had traveled a thousand miles to Moscow and climbed onto a crowded subway train at rush hour with an explosives-packed belt strapped around her waist. She was accompanied by a 17-year-old girl, also from Dagestan, who blew herself up at another station.

In the Russian news media, the women were immediately dubbed "black widows." Their assault on the subway was taken as proof that the country had been shuttled back to the fearsome days when hollow-eyed female militants stalked Moscow and other cities far from the wars where their men fought Russian forces.

The subway bombings also sent ripples of unease across the turbulent, mostly Muslim republics strung along Russia's southern edge. There was angst over the slaying of civilians and fear of retaliation.

But it came as slim surprise that women were ready to die. This, after all, is a landscape of damaged women, grieving losses they dare not dwell upon.

The closer you get to the fighting in the Caucasus, the murkier it appears. The violence in Dagestan, and in neighboring Chechnya and Ingushetia, is not easy to classify -- it's a mix of rebels who want independence from Russia, Islamist extremists bent on waging jihad, local clan and gang warfare and sectarian strife.

And as the fighting intensifies, it is the men who disappear. Masked agents pound on the door and cart them off for questioning. They come back beaten, or not at all. Sometimes the men are rebels; other times, their affiliations are bafflingly vague.

It's the women who are left behind, their status and material comforts tangled up in the choices of their fathers, sons and husbands.

Sharipova lived in a spacious, gated house with grape trellises and dizzying views up the mountainsides. Her mother teaches biology; her father is a self-described "patriot of the motherland" who teaches Russian literature.

She was a serious young woman who studied mathematics, psychology and computers. She was also a homebody who, in the words of her mother, "didn't mix well." When not working as the deputy principal of the village school, she busied herself with home improvement projects, cooked pilaf and fussed over clothes.

The fighting crept into the village. Security forces periodically staged "cleanup operations," swarming Balakhani with armored personnel carriers, helicopters and legions of ground troops, cutting off access to the mosque and searching house by house for signs of rebels. >>> Megan K. Stack | Monday, April 12, 2010

After Attacks in Russia, Fears of Xenophobia
Lilya Paizulayeva, a Chechen in Moscow, worries about profiling and said, “This whole week I have felt like a stranger in this city.” Photo: The New York Times
THE NEW YORK TIMES: MOSCOW — Lilya Paizulayeva descended into the subway anxiously, trying to keep her distance from the crowds and the newly deployed and heavily armed police officers. She cringed at the train’s loud metallic shriek, pressing herself to the wall.

She was not scared of suicide bombers — she feared being taken for one herself.

With her jet-black hair and large dark eyes, Ms. Paizulayeva, a 26-year-old native of Chechnya, looks very much the daughter of Russia’s fiery North Caucasus region, from where, investigators say, two young women traveled to Moscow to blow themselves up last week in the rush-hour throngs, killing at least 40 people.

While for many the attacks are an unsettling reminder of the female suicide bombers who have terrorized this city for years, women from the Caucasus, particularly from Chechnya, say they worry about the return of the arbitrary arrests, xenophobic attacks and open hostility that many experienced after similar terrorist attacks in the past.

“Psychologically, I feel a kind of alarm inside,” said Ms. Paizulayeva, who was born in Chechnya’s capital, Grozny, and fled to Moscow in 1995 with her family when the war there started. “Though I’m dressed like a local, I think that perhaps someone could attack me in the metro,” she said. “This whole week I have felt like a stranger in this city.”

Though Russian citizens, Chechens and others from the North Caucasus are often seen as foreigners in Russia, especially here in the capital, and are frequently associated with immigrants from the countries of Central Asia that were former Soviet republics. More than 1,000 miles from Moscow, Chechnya has its own language, religion and customs, as well as a history of violent separatism that many in the rest of the country find alien in the best of times and threatening in the worst.

There have already been several reports of revenge attacks against people from the Caucasus in the wake of the bombings. Last week a brawl broke out on a subway train when a group of passengers insisted on inspecting the bags of several people who appeared to be from the Caucasus, according to the Sova Center, an organization that tracks xenophobic violence.

Attacks against people with darker skin and hair typical of those from the Caucasus are not uncommon in Russia. >>> Michael Schwirtz | Easter Monday, April 05, 2010

SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL: The Kremlin's Helplessness – Discontent Grows over Moscow's Impotency in Dealing with Terror: Following last week's terrorist attacks on the Moscow metro, Russians are now fearing a fresh wave of violence. Many feel the Kremlin has been hopeless in dealing with Caucasus terror and that the government does more to protect its own power than the people. >>> Matthias Schepp in Moscow | Easter Monday, April 05, 2010

Russie : Nouvel attentat-suicide dans une république instable du Caucase russe
LE POINT: L'insécurité s'installe dans le Caucase. Deux policiers ont été tués lundi dans un attentat perpétré par un kamikaze qui a déclenché sa ceinture d'explosifs devant un bâtiment de la police en Ingouchie, république instable du Caucase russe, a annoncé le comité d'enquête du parquet général russe. Cette attaque intervient après une série d'attentats meurtriers la semaine dernière en Russie (plus de 50 morts).

"Lundi matin à Karaboulak, un inconnu a déclenché sa ceinture d'explosifs au moment où des policiers en voiture entraient dans l'enceinte d'un bâtiment du ministère de l'Intérieur", a raconté le parquet dans un communiqué. "Le kamikaze a été tué sur place, deux policiers ont succombé à leurs blessures et trois ont été blessés", a-t-il ajouté. Moins d'une heure après l'attaque, la police a découvert une bombe dans un véhicule stationné à l'extérieur de l'enceinte de la police de Karaboulak (centre de l'Ingouchie) et l'a désamorcée, provoquant une explosion qui n'a pas fait de victime, a indiqué à l'AFP une source au sein des forces de sécurité. >>> LePoint.fr avec AFP | Lundi 05 Avril 2010

Islamic Terrorism: Second 'Black Widow' Moscow Metro Bomber Named as Maryam Magomedov
TIMES ONLINE: A 28-year-old computer science teacher has been identified by her family as the second of two female suicide bombers who killed dozens of people on the Moscow metro a week ago, a newspaper has reported.

Rasul Magomedov recognised his missing daughter Maryam after being shown photos of the remains of the unidentified suicide bomber, the novayagazeta.ru website said.

More than 50 people have been killed in suicide attacks in Russia over the past week, both in the Moscow metro by bombers Russian media have dubbed “black widows”, and in a town in the turbulent North Caucasus region of Dagestan.

Fears of a new bombing campaign against the Russian heartland increased after a double bomb attack on a railway line on Sunday which security forces said was linked to the earlier attacks.

“My wife and I immediately recognised our daughter Maryam. When my wife last saw our daughter she was wearing the same red scarf we saw in the pictures,” Mr Magomedov, a teacher from the village of Balakhany in Dagestan, told Novaya Gazeta.

Mr Magomedov said his daughter graduated with a degree in mathematics and psychology from the Dagestan Pedagogical University in 2005. She returned to her village, lived at home and taught computer science at a local school.

“I would really like the investigation to uncover the true picture of what happened. We cannot even suggest how Maryam could get to Moscow. Yes, she was religious. But she never expressed any radical beliefs,” he said. >>> Foreign Staff | Easter Monday, April 05, 2010

Turkey's Moves towards Iran Concerning United States
THE TELEGRAPH: Turkey's attempts to develop a strategic partnership with Iran are causing concern in America and are likely to dominate talks between its leader and President Barack Obama during a US visit that starts today.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is likely to discuss his country's strategic partnership with Iran during his US visit . Photograph: The Telegraph
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister, has introduced a "good neighbours" foreign policy that has tilted the axis of Ankara's diplomacy in the direction of Iran, Russia and bordering states.

Turkish frustration with a series of setbacks for its bid to join the European Union triggered a search for a foreign policy that reflect its historical interests in the Middle East, Caucasus and Islamic world.

Foreign intelligence officials sounded an alarm over Turkish manoeuvring closer to Iran, which has undermined the international campaign to isolate the Islamic regime. In particular it has allowed key members of the Islamic regime to move large sums of money – up to $10 million per day – into the global financial system.

Turkey has become a prized outlet for Iranian transactions since a tight regime of sanctions cut off Iranian banks from international finance.

Turkey was one of a handful of countries that refused to support a reprimand imposed on Iran over its failure to declare secret nuclear facility last month. Iranian activists have complained that the regime's agents can operate with impunity in a country that was once a safe haven for those fleeing persecution. >>> Damien McElroy, Foreign Affairs Correspondent | Monday, December 07, 2009

Tensions High in Caucasus
TIMESONLINE: A US Navy flagship carrying humanitarian aid yesterday steamed into a Georgian port where Russian troops are still stationed, stoking tensions once again in the tinderbox Caucasus region.

A previous trip by US warships was cancelled at the last minute a week ago amid fears that an armed stand-off could intensify in the Black Sea port of Poti.

The arrival of the USS Mount Whitney, flagship of the 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean, came as Moscow accused Dick Cheney, the hawkish US Vice-President, of stoking tensions during a visit to Tbilisi this week. After meeting President Saakashvili, Mr Cheney vowed to bring Georgia into the Nato alliance. Russia sees such moves as Western encroachment on its traditional sphere of influence.

Russia’s leaders have accused previous US warships that docked at the port of Batumi, to the south, of delivering weapons to re-arm the smashed Georgian military — charges that Washington denied. US Warship Confronts Russian Military in ‘Tinderbox’ Port >>> By James Hider in Tbilisi and Tony Halpin in Moscow | September 6, 2008

The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Paperback – USA)
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Hardcover – USA)

Russia: The New Order Cometh
INTERNATIONAL ANALYST NETWORK: There are two critical lessons to be learned from the recent Russian-Georgian war. First, Western security commitments should not to be made unless they can be enforced; and second, autonomous ethnic regions within tiny nations that border powerful states carry the potential for future conflicts.

The Russian-Georgian war was the by-product of a poorly thought out American foreign policy in the Caucasus because it attempted to gain American influence against Russia without providing sufficient American power to sustain that policy when challenged by Russia. This does not excuse the brutal application of Russian power against a tiny neighboring state, but it goes a long way in explaining why America responded as it did, and why American foreign policy in the Caucasus has proven to be without substance.

During the war, President Bush proclaimed America’s "unwavering support" for the former Soviet republic of Georgia. For the U.S. however, it was just another hollow gesture that reinforced an unfortunate pattern of American hubris. Bush lauded the Rose Revolution that swept Mikheil Saakashvili to power, backed Georgia's bid to enter NATO, and traveled to Tbilisi in 2005 to give his "pledge to the Georgian people that you've got a solid friend in America". In response, the Georgians aligned themselves with the U.S., sent 2,000 troops to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan beside American forces, and even named a main road in Tbilisi after Bush. At the White House last March, Saakashvili expressed his gratitude to the president for having "really put Georgia firmly on the world's freedom map."

Nevertheless, when push came to shove, the American response to the Russian invasion of South Ossetia and Abkhazia was all rhetoric in large measure because the U.S. was already over-extended in Iraq and Afghanistan and had neither the power, the strategic necessity nor the political capital to take on the Russians over Georgia – and the Russians knew it. The weak U.S. response to the Russian invasion has not only diminished U.S. standing in the region, but arguably as a world power as well. As a friend and ally, Georgia was abandoned to the mercies of the Russian war machine and the other former Soviet republics have no doubt taken note of this.

In many ways, the war was inevitable. Post-World War II Western strategy toward the Soviet Union and its satellites was shaped by George Kennan’s 1947 Cold War doctrine of “containment”. For decades, the U.S. alliances that encircled the Soviet bloc sent a clear message to Stalin and his successors: “Not one more inch!” With the fall of the Soviet Union, that policy was extended under the Clinton and Bush administrations to the former Soviet republics but was propelled by the idea of promoting democratic change and stability in the newly-freed countries that border Russia. While the Russians continually questioned Western motives for this expansion, there was little they could do about it. Over the last few years, however, a newly empowered and resurgent oligarchy under Russian nationalist Prime Minister Vladimir Putin began to see these American overtures as an existential threat. Russia: The New Order Cometh >>> By Mark Silverberg | August 29, 2008

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Miliband Urges Tough Response to Russia
Watch video: The UK foreign secretary has called on the EU to initiate "hard-headed engagement" with Russia in response to its actions in Georgia >>>
BBC: UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband has called on the EU and Nato to initiate "hard-headed engagement" with Russia in response to its actions in Georgia.

In a speech in Ukraine's capital, Kiev, he urged them to bolster their allies, re-balance the energy relationship with Russia and defend international law.

Mr Miliband also warned the Russian president not to start a new Cold War.

His visit came a day after Dmitry Medvedev recognised the independence of Georgia's two breakaway regions.

Earlier, Ukraine's president said it was a hostage in a war waged by Russia against countries in the old Soviet bloc. UK Urges Tough Response to Russia >>> | August 27, 2008

BBC:
Russia Faces Fresh Condemnation >>> | August 27, 2008

THE TELEGRAPH:
Georgia: Europe United to Condemn Kremlin: David Miliband joined a chorus of Western leaders to condemn Russia, accusing the Kremlin of jeopardising European security by recognising Georgia's two breakaway regions.

The rhetorical salvoes showed the new strain on relations with Russia. For its part, the Kremlin said it had only defended its citizens in Abkhazia and South Ossetia and Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, argued the decision had been "unavoidable".

Speaking in Ukraine's capital, Kiev, the Foreign Secretary said that Russia was "more isolated, less trusted and less respected" as a result of its actions in Georgia. These breached a United Nations Resolution, approved by Moscow last April, which reaffirmed Georgia's sovereignty over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

Mr Miliband placed the onus for avoiding a new Cold War firmly on President Dmitry Medvedev of Russia. "The Russian President says he is not afraid of a new Cold War. We don't want a new Cold War. He has a big responsibility not to start one," he said.

Comparing Russia's actions to the Prague Spring of 1968, when Moscow suppressed a reformist Czech government, Mr Miliband said: "The sight of Russian tanks in a neighbouring country on the 40th anniversary of the crushing of the Prague Spring has shown that the temptations of power politics remain. The old sores and divisions fester. And Russia is not yet reconciled to the new map of this region."

Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Germany's foreign minister, issued a stark warning. "If we don't watch out, Europe's whole security architecture will start to falter with unforeseeable consequences for all of us. The spiral of provocation must stop immediately," he said.

France, which holds the European Union's rotating presidency, expressed concern that Moscow, emboldened by its military success in Georgia, could turn on other former Soviet republics with breakaway provinces and large Russian minorities.
Bernard Kouchner, the French foreign minister, described the situation as "very dangerous" and said: "There are other objectives that one can suppose are objectives for Russia, in particular the Crimea, Ukraine and Moldova." >>> By Con Coughlin in Kiev, Adrian Blomfield in Tbilisi and Harry de Quetteville in Berlin | August 28, 2008

MAIL Online:
Russia Gives Two Fingers as It Continues to Stand Up to the West >>> | August 27, 2008

TIMESONLINE:
Cold War Tension Rises as Putin Talks of Black Sea Confrontation: A new Cold War between Russia and the West grew steadily closer yesterday after the Kremlin gave a warning about “direct confrontation” between American and Russian warships in the Black Sea.

Dmitri Peskov, a spokesman for Vladimir Putin, the Prime Minister, declared that Russia was taking “measures of precaution” against American and Nato naval ships. “Let’s hope we do not see any direct confrontation in that,” he said.

Any attempt by countries in the West to isolate Russia would “definitely harm the economic interests of those states”, he said. >>> By Michael Evans, Defence Editor | August 28, 2008

THE GUARDIAN:
EU Threatens Sanctions against Russia: Leading European powers losing patience with Kremlin's sabre rattling in the Caucuses

European Union leaders are to discuss sanctions against Russia ahead of an emergency summit meeting, the French foreign minister said today, as the west hardened its position towards Moscow.

When asked what measures the west could take against Russia in the crisis over Georgia, Bernard Kouchner told a press conference in Paris: "Sanctions are being considered." >>> By Mark Tran, Julian Borger in Kiev, Ian Traynor in Brussels, and agencies | August 28, 2008

WELT ONLINE:
Russland aktiviert die Waffen des Kalten Krieges >>> Von Manfred Quiring | 28. August 2008

TOWNHALL.COM:
Farewell, NATO >>> By Victor Davis Hanson | August 28, 2008

THE TELEGRAPH:
Dmitry Medvedev Claims Diplomatic Victory for Russia: President Dmitry Medvedev of Russia claimed to have won a diplomatic victory by securing the backing of China and key Central Asian states for its actions in Georgia and its breakaway regions >>> By Richard Spencer in Beijing | August 28, 2008

NZZ Online:
Russland sitzt auf verlorenem Posten: Asiatische Staaten fordern territoriale Integrität Georgiens

Russland ist mit seinem Vorgehen in Georgien bei seinen asiatischen Partnern in der Shanghaier Kooperationsorganisation (SCO) auf Ablehnung gestossen. Bei ihrem Gipfeltreffen in Duschanbe, der Hauptstadt Tadschikistans, verabschiedeten die Präsidenten aus sechs asiatischen Staaten eine Erklärung, in der sie die Anwendung militärischer Gewalt in Georgien verurteilen und die Achtung der territorialen Integrität eines jeden Staates fordern. >>> | 28. August 2008

BBC:
Georgia Breaks Ties with Russia: Georgia has decided to cut diplomatic ties with Russia, days after Moscow recognised the independence of Georgia's two breakaway regions >>> | August 29, 2008

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Russia Threatens New Confrontation over Georgian Provinces
THE TELEGRAPH: A fresh confrontation between Moscow and the West was looming after Russia announced that it was preparing to recognise the independence of the two Georgian breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia

The State Duma, Russia's parliament, has been recalled and will meet in emergency session on Monday to debate an Abkhaz appeal for immediate recognition of the region's sovereignty. The South Ossetian rebel leader, Eduard Kokoity, said he would follow suit imminently.

Russian acquiescence to the proposals would inevitably mark a serious escalation of the crisis in the Caucasus by further undermining a fragile ceasefire in the area and creating a fresh diplomatic rift with the United States and Europe.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia has signed 14 United Nations Security Council resolutions upholding accepting that Abkhazia and South Ossetia remain part of Georgia despite establishing rebel administrations after secessionist wars in the early 1990s.

But after crushing Georgia on the battlefield, Russia has indicated that it was no longer prepared to honour UN edicts on the breakaway provinces. Earlier this week, Russia's foreign minister Sergei Lavrov told the world to "forget" about Georgia's territorial integrity.

Moscow is now signaling that it will move much quicker than expected in formally recognizing the two regions.

Sergei Mironov, speaker of the Duma's upper house or Federation Council, said a vote on recognition would be overwhelmingly passed.

"The Federation Council is ready to recognize the independent states of South Ossetia and Abkhazia if that is what the people of these republics want," he said. Russia Threatens New Confrontation over Georgian Provinces >>> By Adrian Blomfield in Tbilisi | August 20, 2008

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A New World Order: The Week Russia Flexed Its Military Muscle
THE INDEPENDENT: A six-day conflict in the Caucasus mountains has transformed the international balance of power, with Russia now looking stronger than ever. But what sparked it? Diplomatic Editor Anne Penketh reveals how the Georgian government walked straight into a trap set by Moscow – and considers the consequences of the first war in Europe for a decade

The Georgian president was on vacation in Italy. The defence minister and foreign minister were away on holiday too. The world's attention was riveted on the Olympic Games in Beijing, where the preparations for the lavish opening ceremony were in full swing.

Days later, the forces of the small, mountainous republic of Georgia, trained by American and Israeli experts, were fighting for the survival of their country against Russia's army in a vicious six-day war that brought Russia and the US into direct confrontation for the first time since the Cold War and led to a threat of nuclear conflagration.

The outcome was the humiliating rout of the Georgian army, pushed back by a huge Russian land, air and sea assault, and the loss of Georgia's two breakaway territories over which the government had intended to assert central control. And Russia is back at the forefront of a new world order in the dying days of the Bush presidency.

Few would have predicted that the firefights in Georgia's breakaway territory of South Ossetia between ethnic Ossetians and Georgian forces in the first week of August would escalate into a David versus Goliath combat in the Caucasus on 8 August. On that day, Vladimir Putin and George Bush were sitting only a few feet apart at the Olympic ceremony. The US president watched events through binoculars. He remained a spectator during the conflict, too, watching closely but letting it be known that the US would not intervene militarily to save Georgia.

As the dust begins to settle, it is becoming clear – based on accounts from Georgian officials, Russian officials and Western diplomats – that the pro-Western government of Georgia fell into a trap set by Russia following Nato's loss of nerve at a summit in April, when Nato leaders declined to offer Georgia a firm timetable for membership. And when Russia hit back with overwhelming force, the West was caught napping. A New World Order: The Week Russia Flexed Its Military Muscle >>> By Anne Penketh, Diplomatic Editor | August 20, 2008

SPIEGELONLINE INTERNATIONAL:
The Dangerous Neighbour - Vladimir Putin Takes on a Powerless West: Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin approached the crisis in Georgia coolly and efficiently, prompting admiration even from some American observers. But Moscow's brutal strike against Georgian President Saakashvili has divided the Western world, with the split running straight through the European Union >>> | August 18, 2008

NZZ Online:
Russland lehnt Uno-Resolutionsentwurf zum Kaukasus ab: Rice wirft Moskau Zerstörung ziviler Infrastruktur vor >>> | 20. August 2008

The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Dust Jacket Hardcover, direct from the publishers (US) >>>
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Russian President Dmitry Medvedev Vows Further Retribution against Georgia

THE TELEGRAPH: Dmitry Medvedev, the Russian president, said Georgian actions would not go 'unpunished' as the United States accused Moscow of deploying short-range missiles to positions within range of the Georgian capital Tbilisi.

Amid few signs that the Kremlin was honouring its latest pledge to withdraw troops, Mr Medvedev also threatened to "crush" any other ex-Soviet states that attempted to follow Georgia's example by killing Russian citizens.

For the first time since the conflict began 11 days ago, Mr Medvedev was allowed to stand in for Vladimir Putin, the prime minister, who has clearly been in charge of running Russia's war.

Giving a passable imitation of his predecessor, the president - who has been given coaching to imitate Mr Putin's abrasive style - adopted an uncompromising position that appeared designed to defy the United States, which has solidly backed Georgia during the conflict.

"What the Georgian authorities did exceeded human understanding," he told troops at a Russian military base in Vladikavkaz, a city in the Caucasus close to the Georgian border. "Their actions cannot be explained and moreover must not go unpunished."

Mr Medvedev gave no hint over what further retribution against Georgia he sought. Russia has already announced plans to launch a genocide investigation against the Georgian government, perhaps with the view to bringing war crimes charges against President Mikheil Saakashvili.

Meanwhile, Pentagon officials confirmed Russia had deployed short-range SS-21 missiles inside the Georgian breakaway region of South Ossetia, a move that is likely to unnerve Mr Saakashvili's government and undermine the already fragile ceasefire. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev Vows Further Retribution against Georgia >>> By Adrian Blomfield near Gori | August 19, 2008

THE NEW YORK TIMES:
Russia Seems to Be Hunkering Down in Georgia >>> By Andrew E Kramer | August 18, 2008

The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Dust Jacket Hardcover, direct from the publishers (UK) >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Paperback, direct from the publishers (UK) >>>