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Atlantic Council blogs provide short-form analyses from Council experts and a wider community of global voices on the world’s most important news stories.
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New Atlanticist

Apr 1, 2019

NATO membership for Cyprus. Yes, Cyprus.

By Damon Wilson

With NATO membership built into any settlement, Greek and Turkish Cypriot communities, along with Athens and Ankara, and in partnership with all of their European partners and NATO allies, might have more confidence in striking a deal.

Greece NATO

IranSource

Mar 30, 2019

Iran’s Hurricane Katrina moment

By Borzou Daragahi

Iranian authorities barred international journalists from covering the disastrous floods that have stricken most of the country’s provinces and caused death and mayhem during the normally festive two-week Nowruz holidays that follow the Iranian new year.

Iran

New Atlanticist

Mar 29, 2019

North Macedonia negates NATO skeptics

By Teri Schultz

The price of compromising was high — many citizens remain opposed to it — but the cost of not doing so, the government concluded, would have been infinitely higher. Radmila Šekerinska, the defense minister of North Macedonia, is unapologetic about that decision.

Greece NATO

UkraineAlert

Mar 29, 2019

Whoever wins Ukraine’s presidential race, Russia has already lost

By Peter Dickinson

It’s election season on Kremlin TV, but the presidential campaign receiving wall-to-wall coverage from Russia’s federal channels is taking place across the border in Ukraine. This is hardly surprising. Moscow’s obsession with all things Ukrainian is well-documented and reflects the centrality of information operations to Vladimir Putin’s five-year hybrid war against Ukraine. What’s interesting about […]

Conflict Defense Policy

New Atlanticist

Mar 29, 2019

Russia ups the ante in Venezuela

By Ashish Kumar Sen

“Maduro’s survival gives Russia a foothold in the Americas,” explained Jason Marczak.

Russia Venezuela

New Atlanticist

Mar 29, 2019

Theresa May’s day of ignominy

By John M. Roberts

The fifty-eight-vote defeat means that while nothing is clear concerning Britain’s future relations with the EU, May’s own future is settled. She has none.

United Kingdom

UkraineAlert

Mar 29, 2019

Who gains from using the far-right in Ukraine’s elections?

By Taras Kuzio

The G-7 wrote to Minister of Interior Arsen Avakov about the threat to Ukraine’s presidential election from the far-right National Corps political party and National Militia civic organization, both led by Andriy Biletsky with whom he has had a long relationship. The G-7 warned, “They intimidate Ukrainian citizens, try to usurp the role of the […]

Elections Extremism

New Atlanticist

Mar 29, 2019

Here’s how to tackle money laundering

By Anders Åslund

Europe needs to go to the root of the problem — dirty money that primarily originates in Russia.

Corruption European Union

EnergySource

Mar 29, 2019

Black Sea natural gas games: A fork in the road for the BRUA Pipeline project

By Nolan Theisen and John Szabo

Hopes were riding high on the discovery of Romania’s Black Sea natural gas deposits in 2012, which were expected to provide a cheap and local source of the fuel for Central and South Eastern Europe (CSEE). ExxonMobil and OMV Petrom would carry out the offshore production, and the Bulgaria-Romania-Hungary-Austria (BRUA) pipeline project, formally conceived in […]

Central Europe Eastern Europe

IranSource

Mar 29, 2019

Nowruz floods in Iran anger many but reasons are complex

By Holly Dagres

The Iranian new year, Nowruz, is supposed to be a time of joy and celebration when Iranians visit family and go on vacation in other provinces. But for many this year, it was a time of sorrow and loss. Heavy rains, first welcomed in the drought-stricken country, turned into catastrophic floods. Twenty-eight of Iran’s thirty-one […]

Iran