Eurasia

Russia announced on Tuesday it would finish building a new base for its Black Sea fleet by 2016 to replace the historic Crimean Sevastopol port it has been ordered by Ukraine to evacuate. Sevastopol has been home to the Russian fleet for more than two centuries. With the 1991 collapse …

Forensic experts have unearthed a mass grave in the eastern Kosovo town of Gnjilane containing 11 bodies including four children, the European Union mission (EULEX) said in a statement on Tuesday. The victims are believed to be ethnic Albanians killed in the early days of a two year counter-insurgency war …

WASHINGTON Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s visit to the Georgian breakaway region of South Ossetia has not contributed to promoting stability following last year’s brief war, the US State Department said Tuesday.

The caucus of Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) deputies in Bosnia’s Serb-dominated entity of Republika Srpska are boycotting the local parliament until they are granted equal voting rights. “It is logical that this will lead to the blockade of the work of the [Republika Srpska] institutions, but Bosniaks had no other choice,” …

The last remaining United Nations observers in Georgia leave their posts on Wednesday, a month after their mandate expired.The UN Security Council failed to extend the mission of the 130 observers last month, due to a Russian veto. Last August, Russia backed Abkhazia’s declaration of independence from Georgia. But no …

The MP’s from Bulgaria’s recently elected new Parliament swore in at its first session on Tuesday. Six parties have entered Bulgaria’s top legislative body – Sofia Mayor Boyko Borisov’s center-right GERB, the Socialist-led Coalition for Bulgaria, the Movement for rights and Freedoms, the Blue Coalition, far right nationalists ATAKA and …

ZAGREB Croatian Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor has told Macedonian President Gjorgje Ivanov that Zagreb supports Skopje’s Euro-Atlantic integration. Kosor said that the deadlock in Croatia’s negotiating process with the European Union had negatively impacted on the countries of South-East Europe, according to a statement from the Croatian government.

ZAGREB Croatian President Stjepan Mesić says that his country remains committed to regional cooperation and removing all obstacles in the way of such cooperation. 

Now is the right moment for a compromise solution to the row between Athens and Skopje over Macedonia’s name, the European Union foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, said on Tuesday in Skopje. During talks with Macedonia’s Prime Minister, Nikola Gruevski, Solana urged the leadership to do everything in its power …

The Young European Federalist Movement, JEF, has criticized the EU visa liberalisation policy towards the Western Balkans, arguing that it could potentially create new divisions and anti-EU sentiments by leaving out Muslim minorities. The European Commission will ask the EU Council this week to offer visa-free travel to citizens of …