Eurasia

The wait is (nearly) over. After more than a year of ups and downs since Sweden applied to join NATO in May 2022, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has agreed to back Stockholm’s bid to become the Alliance’s thirty-second member. The announcement came on the eve of the NATO Summit …

The leaders were backed by a NATO banner, but it wasn’t NATO doing the backing. Group of Seven (G7) leaders on Wednesday announced plans for long-term security commitments to Ukraine at the NATO Summit in Vilnius, Lithuania. The new framework seeks to create bilateral security commitments between individual G7 member …

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan talks about an “evil West” but wants to become part of it — perhaps to “improve” it? Erdoğan needs money. He needs it now, and preferably from Western markets instead of one-off cash injections from Russia and friendly Gulf states. Erdoğan aims to… [k]eep within …

As the sustained rise in the value of the lek causes a crisis in exports, action is needed – but will a country that seemingly turns a blind eye to manifest criminality in whole sectors of the economy bite the bullet?Albania’s government acknowledged lately that the country’s exporters are facing …

Spain’s 6-month presidency of the Council of the EU has been upended by a snap election in July. Yet regardless of who wins that vote, prospects for progress on the issue of EU enlargement are poor.From July 1, Spain took over the rotating presidency of the Council of the EU, …

The Debate Over How to End the War There Can Be No Negotiations With Putin In “An Unwinabble War” (July/August 2023), Samuel Charap makes the case that Washington should “start facilitating an endgame” for the war in Ukraine. His argument rests on his assumption that a definitive outcome is out …

Russia may have already lost upwards of 50,000 men in Ukraine, along with untold economic costs from sanctions, direct expenses and forgone labor. Many in the West have hoped that Russia’s invasion, failing to take the whole of Ukraine in the early stages of the war, will prove to be …

Imran Rehman, a 32-year-old Catholic Christian man, has been unjustly detained in Camp Jail Lahore for the past ten months on charges of blasphemy and terrorism. Imran, a devoted father of two daughters, was working at the Lahore Metro Bus ticket office when he was taken into custody by the …

Diplomacy is working in Yemen in the way that diplomacy so often does in complex conflicts: slowly but surely. In April 2022, the United Nations brokered a nationwide truce in Yemen. The most substantial pause in fighting since the war began in 2014, the truce led to a substantial reduction …

At the NATO summit in Vilnius starting Tuesday, the transatlantic military alliance will plan the future of Western support for Ukraine, including a multiyear assistance package and upgraded political ties. Repelling Russia’s invasion will be top of mind. But longer-term security decisions will be just as important—if not more so—to …