Azerbaijan is ready to open its border with Armenia and establish formal relations if Yerevan returns five occupied regions adjacent to disputed Nagorno-Karabakh, an Azerbaijani official has said. READ MORE

Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev has instructed the government to form a State Commission on Preparations for Kazakhstan's Chairmanship of the OSCE. Personally chairing an enlarged inter-departmental meeting on this subject, Nazarbayev described Kazakhstan's chairmanship of the OSCE in 2010 as a "national strategic project." The State Commission should coordinate all aspects of the country's effort, from policy analysis and diplomatic activity to personnel training and public outreach. READ MORE

The ceremony devoted to the accomplishment of gas pipeline took place on September 9th in Sakiai region of Lithuania. READ MORE

Dmitry Medvedev interfered into Russian-Ukrainian gas talks. READ MORE

The Ambassador of Kazakhstan, the Head of the Mission of the Republic to the EU and NATO Erik Utembayev met the Secretary General of the European Union Javier Solana in Brussels. READ MORE

In the course of its 60 years, NATO has institutionalized three monumental transformations in world affairs: first, the end of the centuries-long “civil war” within the West for trans-oceanic and European supremacy; second, the United States’s post–World War II commitment to the defense of Europe against Soviet domination; and third, the peaceful termination of the Cold War, which created the preconditions for a larger democratic European Union. READ MORE

During an official visit to Kazakhstan, Estonian Prime Minister Andrus Ansip signed two bilateral agreements within the meeting with Kazakhstan Prime Minister Karim Massimov.  According to the news agency REGNUM Novosti, on September 7th Estonian Government Office received the both agreements – one on the issue of visas abolishment for diplomats of both countries, and on the issue of economic, scientific and technical cooperation. READ MORE

President of the Republic of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaitė and President of the Republic of France Nicolas Sarkozy signed a strategic partnership agreement which is the first document of this kind in the history of the two countries. READ MORE

The murky world of Moldovan politics has become murkier still with acting President Vladimir Voronin's announcement that he will resign that post if his Communist Party officially goes into the opposition, as it is almost certain to do. READ MORE

The thesis that the EU is perceived by citizens of Eastern Europe in the light of its visa policy towards them is hardly a new one. Indeed, for most applicants, a meeting with a consular officer constitutes their first opportunity to come face to face with those representing the EU. In this regard, the way in which this process is carried out can either contribute to a positive image of the European Union in the eyes of the outside world, or on the contrary it can significantly diminish the reputation of EU Member States, particularly when the visa application process could become, as stated by Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn, a “bureaucratic and costly nightmare.” READ MORE