The February 26–27 round of the nuclear negotiations involving Iran and the P5+1 group (all five permanent UN Security Council members and Germany) in Almaty went as well as might have reasonably been expected. Nobody expected a breakthrough and none occurred. Yet, the sides met at a high level for the first time in months and they discussed detailed proposals as well as principles. The six powers suggested the consideration of a series of steps that would see increasing sanctions relief (the initial proposal was easing a ban on trade in precious metals like gold and relaxation of an import embargo on Iranian petrochemical products) in return for increasing constraints on Iran’s nuclear program (beginning with a suspension of uranium enrichment to a fissile concentration of 20 percent at its Fordow underground facility). READ MORE

Armenia which was trying to present itself as a civilized country, proved otherwise by committing such a terrible crime in Khojaly in the late 20th century, Foreign Ministry's spokesman Elman Abdullayev said at the briefing on Friday. READ MORE

How much influence do interest groups have on EU legislation? Experts are divided, but the online platform LobbyPlag sees a lot. Sometimes, they say, MEPs even copy and paste directly from lobby proposals. READ MORE

Germany’s federal election in September is about more than that country’s future; it’s about Europe. Germany has emerged from the multiple crises of the eurozone as the continent’s pivotal power. U.S. President Barack Obama understood this early in his tenure and it has also been openly acknowledged by the likes of Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, who called for more German leadership in a speech in Berlin. Germany’s indispensability is also acknowledged, albeit less openly, in Britain and France, both of which are still coming to terms with Germany’s preponderance of economic and political power (and its lack of comparable military power). And in countries such as Greece, Spain, and Italy, anti-German sentiments are a grudging acknowledgement that these nations’ fates are determined in Berlin as much as in their own capitals. READ MORE

NATO Defence Ministers agreed concrete goals for more ambitious training and exercises to maintain the lessons of interoperability at their meeting in Brussels on 21 February. READ MORE

Known Ukrainian political analyst, Alyona Getmanciuk, believes that the Transnistrian problem is a "spare part" for the authorities in Kiev READ MORE

The importance of Azerbaijan is rising in the world, David Merkel, senior fellow at the Centre for Transatlantic Relations - John Hopkins University in the U.S. and Former U.S. State Department and National Security Council senior official believes. READ MORE

China has signed no international-legal documents on transboundary water objects. READ MORE

In recent years, Kazakhstan has made an effort to deepen and expand cooperation with the world’s Islamic community. The focus has been on economic and cultural ties, but political and security issues have also been prominent due to the large number of internal and regional conflicts afflicting Muslim majority countries. Toward this end, in 1995, Kazakhstan joined the Organization for Islamic Conference (OIC), which was established in 1969. Kazakhstan then became the first Central Asian country to chair the organization as the rotating head of its Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) from June 2011 to November 2012. READ MORE

United States plans to link the countries of Central Asia by new rail lines with Afghanistan. At the same time, Washington opposes neither the construction of a railway corridor from Central Asia through Iran, nor Chinese extensions of its national rail system into the area. Nevertheless, according to analysts at the Moscow Strategic Culture Foundation, these overlapping transportation development projects threaten to spark a new “railroad war” in the Central Asian region—one that in the absence of counter-efforts by the Russian Federation is likely to result in a sharp reduction of Moscow’s influence over the countries there. READ MORE