NATO is opening a liaison office in Tashkent -- but don't read too much geopolitical significance into the move. A number of Russian-media outlets have reported the move, seeing in it yet another piece of evidence that Uzbekistan is moving away from Russia (leaving the Collective Security Treaty Organization) and toward the West (cooperating with the U.S. on military transit to and from Afghanistan, getting increasing military aid from Washington). READ MORE

The EU’s climate policy has not vanished but the approach today is probably more balanced towards other aims like energy supply security and competitiveness, Friedbert Pflüger said. READ MORE

The Ukrainian government on Wednesday approved a memorandum applying for observer status in the Customs Union, a Moscow-based trade bloc comprising Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said. READ MORE

At the beginning of April German Chancellor Angela Merkel spent her vacation in the island close to Naples. She was visited by the Campania region governor Stefano Caldoro who afterwards posted a video on his website where he urged her to look at the difficult areas including youth unemployment rates 10 times those of Germany. It is not the first time when Germany is criticised by South European countries complaining that they have to apply strict austerity measures in exchange for financial assistance.   READ MORE

Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey must work to attract cargo to be transported through the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars (BTK) railway, which is under construction, the Minister of Economic Development of Azerbaijan Shahin Mustafayev said during a speech at the trilateral Azerbaijani-Georgian-Turkish business forum in Gabala on Saturday. READ MORE