With the Lisbon Treaty, the European Union has more capacity and more powerful tools to establish more of a presence and play a more effective role in resolving Transnistria's frozen conflict, Victor Osipov, deputy prime minister of Moldova, told EurActiv in an exclusive interview. READ MORE

The negotiating directives for Association Agreements with the South Caucasus countries will be presented for formal adoption at the Foreign Affairs Council on May 10, said Štefan Füle, European Commissioner for Enlargement and Neighbourhood Policy. READ MORE

The Gazprom headquarters hosted a working meeting between Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Company’s Management Committee and Ulugbek Nazarov, Chairman of the Uzbekneftegaz national holding company’s Management Committee. READ MORE

In a surprise move, Norway and Russia agreed Tuesday to evenly divide a long-disputed area in the Barents Sea, a promising oil and gas region in the Arctic made more accessible by global warming. READ MORE

Ukrainian lawmakers got rough, threw eggs and smoke bombs, but still voted in favor of deal with Russia ensuring cheaper natural gas for Ukraine in exchange for the lease of a key naval base to Moscow. READ MORE

To stabilize the political situation in Kyrgyzstan,it is necessary to gather representatives of all "clans" and agree upon the structure of the new government in the country, said an American expert on Central Asia Bruce Pannier. READ MORE

Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Romanian are jointly launching a liquefied natural gas (LNG) project, designated as the Azerbaijan-Georgia-Romania Interconnector (AGRI). The three governments regard their project as an element in the EU-planned Southern Corridor for Caspian gas to Europe. READ MORE

Austria has signed up to build part of Russia's South Stream gas pipeline, while keeping a hand in the competing European pipeline Nabucco. READ MORE

Many observers declare that almost two years after the August war in Russia, Georgia appeared to be outside of the list of major issues among western politicians, as well as in Russia and world Mass Media. The one of reasons for that is the sound cooling of attitude of western leaders towards the personality of Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili who remained without urgent support of the resigned colleagues from the USA, Ukraine, Poland and Lithuania. During the last Munich International Conference on Security Georgian President seemed to be lonely. READ MORE

Gas agreements between Russia and Ukraine will not be the reason for reviewing similar contracts with Russia's partners, including Belarus and other CIS countries. This statement was made on April 22 by the head of Russian Ministry of Energy, Sergei Shmatko. "Our negotiations with Ukraine are completed successfully and I don't think they will cause the review of relations with other partners", Russian minister said. READ MORE