This Week’s Highlights:

• Leaders of NATO countries adopted a declaration at the end of their summit to assert that “Russia’s aggressive actions constitute a threat to Euro-Atlantic security,” but also to emphasize that they “remain open for dialogue, and to a constructive relationship with Russia when Russia’s actions make that possible.” Upon arriving in London for the NATO summit, U.S. President Donald Trump hit back at Emmanuel Macron for describing NATO as “brain-dead,” while the French leader stood by the comments and called for comprehensive talks with Russia.
• U.S. Senate Democrats warned that failing to extend New START would hurt U.S. national security and lead to an arms race that could widen the already large federal deficit, RFE/RL reports. “Russia is ready to immediately, as soon as possible, by the end of this year, without any preconditions, extend the START Treaty,” President Vladimir Putin said this week, according to Reuters.
• As Russia began gas supplies to China via the 3,000-kilometer Power of Siberia pipeline, Chinese leader Xi Jinping told Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev in Beijing that China and Russia must cooperate to “safeguard their core interests and the common security of the two countries, and maintain regional and world peace and stability,” according to newspaper reports. “If this … continues for another five or seven years, probably by the late 2020s, we could see something that could be properly called a de facto military alliance between China and Russia,” said Artyom Lukin, a researcher with the Far Eastern Federal University in Vladivostok, as quoted by the South China Morning Post.
• If Russia’s human capital continues to grow at its 2000-2017 average rate of 3.5 percent, it will take about 50 years to catch up with the OECD, according to the World Bank. “We can live on like this 20 years, even more... And then … an even sharper decline in living standards and our ranking in the world will occur and it will be much more difficult for us to keep this large territory unified,” Audit Chamber head Alexei Kudrin said last week, as reported by Nezavismaya Gazeta. One in five Russians are willing to take part in mass political demonstrations, a new poll by Levada shows, according to RFE/RL.
• Ukraine and Russia have reached the final stages of an all-for-all prisoner exchange agreement ahead of a key peace summit on December 9, The Moscow Times reports. Ukrainian presidential aide Andriy Yermak claimed Ukraine would wall off the rest of the country from occupied territories if Russia failed to agree to a ceasefire and prisoner swap at the Normandy Format summit in Paris, according to Reuters.
• As Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenka prepared to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin on Dec. 7-8 to discuss further integration within the Russia-Belarus Union, his country’s ambassador to Russia said, “We are currently working on creating a single parliament and government [with Russia].” Under the new structure, Moscow’s and Minsk’s lawmakers and ministers will “surrender certain binding governing functions higher up,” Ambassador Vladimir Semashko said, according to reports by The Moscow Times and RFE/RL.

I. U.S. and Russian priorities for the bilateral agenda

Nuclear security and safety:

• Argentinian diplomat Rafael Grossi has been sworn in as the new director-general of the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog. “The existence of nuclear material inevitably draws malevolent interest from terrorists and other criminals. It is vital that we remain ahead of the curve in guarding against nuclear terrorism,” Grossi said. (IAEA, 12.02.19, RFE/RL, 12.02.19)

North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs:

• Flights between the Russian city of Vladivostok and Pyongyang are sharply increasing toward the end of this month. North Korean workers in Russia are apparently returning home in large numbers ahead of the Dec. 22 deadline set by a U.N. sanctions resolution. (NHK, 12.06.19)

Iran’s nuclear program and related issues:

• The remaining parties in the Iranian nuclear deal have begun a meeting in Vienna with officials from the Islamic republic in a bid to save the 2015 landmark agreement that the U.S. abandoned last year. The E3 powers are reported to be considering triggering a mechanism in the deal that could lead to the reimposition of U.N. sanctions. (RFE/RL, 12.06.19)
• Russian state nuclear company Rosatom has suspended work on modernizing a unit of Iran's Fordow nuclear complex due to an issue with uranium compatibility. (RFE/RL, 12.05.19)
• The commander of Iran's navy has confirmed that his forces will participate in joint exercises with Russia and China in the northern Indian Ocean from Dec. 22 to Jan. 20. (RFE/RL, 12.01.19)

New Cold War/saber rattling:

• Russia says it is expelling a Bulgarian diplomat five weeks after Sofia declined a visa to the incoming Russian defense attache amid an espionage scandal. (RFE/RL, 12.05.19)
• Germany has expelled two Russian diplomats and its federal prosecutors have taken over the case of the slaying of ethnic Chechen Zelimkhan Khangoshvili in Berlin amid allegations of Russian involvement.  In a statement on Dec. 3, Bellingcat claimed the suspect in the murder was Russian national Vadim Krasikov. (RFE/RL, 12.04.19)

Military issues, including NATO-Russia relations:

• “Russia’s aggressive actions constitute a threat to Euro-Atlantic security … We are addressing and will continue to address in a measured and responsible way Russia’s deployment of new intermediate-range missiles, which brought about the demise of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty and which pose significant risks to Euro-Atlantic security … We remain open for dialogue, and to a constructive relationship with Russia when Russia’s actions make that possible,” said the declaration leaders of NATO countries adopted at the end of their Dec. 3-4 summit in London. (NATO, 12.04.19)
• “Allies are strongly committed to full implementation of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons in all its aspects, including nuclear disarmament, non-proliferation and the peaceful uses of nuclear energy,” said the declaration leaders of NATO countries adopted at the end of their Dec. 3-4 summit in London. (NATO, 12.04.19)
• “We recognize that China’s growing influence and international policies present both opportunities and challenges that we need to address together as an Alliance,” said the declaration leaders of NATO countries adopted at the end of their Dec. 3-4 summit in London. (NATO, 12.04.19)
  • “Some allies would be tempted to please Trump and present China as NATO’s next adversary, but most Europeans know this does not represent their national interest,” one NATO diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Another diplomat cautioned that China would not become NATO’s adversary. “China is not the new Russia. This is not about declaring China as the new enemy,” the diplomat said. “China is the rising power of the 21st century.” (Reuters, 12.05.19)
• Hours after arriving in London for the NATO summit, U.S. President Donald Trump hit back at French President Emmanuel Macron for describing NATO as “brain-dead,” saying he had been "very disrespectful" in what he said were "nasty" comments. Inside a closed-door session of the NATO summit, Trump read a prepared statement listing off grievances about defense spending. But he did not threaten other countries in the same way he had done in previous NATO meetings. (New York Times, 12.04.19, RFE/RL, 12.03.19)
  • Prior to the summit, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said defense spending across European allies and Canada increased by 4.6 percent this year, making this the fifth consecutive year of growth. The NATO chief told journalists in Brussels that by the end of 2020, European countries and Canada will have invested $130 billion more since 2016. (RFE/RL, 11.29.19)
  • One leader, pushing back gently at Trump by trying to demonstrate the importance of defending Europe, pointed out during the closed-door session of the NATO summit that if Russia took over Western Europe, the size of its collective economy would swell larger than that of the U.S., one official said. (New York Times, 12.04.19)
• Prior to the summit, French President Emmanuel Macron has said that he stands by comments he made three weeks ago when he described NATO as "brain-dead.” During the summit, Macron called for comprehensive talks with Russia. "It's important to have a strategic dialogue with Russia," Macron said, adding that the alliance should do so "with its eyes wide open." (RFE/RL, 12.03.19, RFE/RL, 11.29.19)
• At the summit, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has agreed to back NATO’s defense plans for Poland and the Baltic states. Turkey had previously said it would oppose NATO’s plan unless the alliance accepted Turkey’s designation of certain groups as terrorists, including the Kurdish YPG militia. (Reuters, 12.04.19)
• Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan allegedly authorized the downing of a Russian warplane in an incident that briefly soured their relationship four years ago, the Turkey-focused Nordic Monitor website reported, citing a report to NATO it says it obtained. (The Moscow Times, 12.05.19)
• Turkey's presidential administration has said that the purchase date for more S-400 missile systems from Russia is just a technicality and that it thinks the deal will happen before too long. (Reuters, 12.02.19)
• Russian President Vladimir Putin on Dec. 3 criticized NATO's continued expansion, something he suggested was pointless given the absence of a threat from Moscow following the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. Speaking at a meeting of Russian military leaders in Sochi, Putin said NATO expansion posed a threat to Russia, but said he hoped that a shared interest in common security would prevail. (Reuters, 12.03.19)

Missile defense:

• No significant developments.

Nuclear arms control:

• “Russia is ready to immediately, as soon as possible, by the end of this year, without any preconditions, extend the START Treaty so that there would be no further double or triple interpretation of our position,” Russian President Vladimir Putin said. (Reuters, 12.05.19)
• French President Emmanuel Macron on Nov. 28 denied having accepted a Russian proposal to impose a moratorium on missile deployments in Europe, but said it was important the Kremlin initiative not be simply dismissed. "But we considered that, as a basis for discussion, we shouldn't just brush it off ... Let's be serious, this is the security of Europe we're talking about," he said. (Reuters, 11.28.19)
• U.S. Senate Democrats warned that failing to extend New START would hurt U.S. national security and lead to an arms race that could widen the already large federal deficit. (RFE/RL, 12.03.19)
• U.S. and Russian participants in the Dartmouth Conference have urged their governments to extend a key nuclear arms control treaty which expires in February 2021. “Drawing upon six decades of constructive contacts between American and Russian citizens, we … have decided to issue this urgent appeal to our governments, warning of the dangers of a new nuclear arms race and strongly urging both governments to act immediately to extend the New START Treaty,” the participants in this Track II event wrote in a statement they released on Friday. (Russia Matters, 12.06.19)
• Frank Wuco, a former conservative talk radio host and naval intelligence officer who suggested dropping nuclear bombs on Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks, now works on arms control issues at the State Department, according to two U.S. officials familiar with the matter. (The Washington Post, 11.25.19)

Counter-terrorism:

• "Is our enemy today Russia, as I sometimes hear? Is it China? Is it the goal of NATO to designate them as enemies? I don't believe so. Our common enemy today is terrorism, which has hit each of our countries," French President Emmanuel Macron said ahead of the NATO summit. (RFE/RL, 11.29.19)

Conflict in Syria:

• At least 15 civilians were killed on Dec. 2 when Syrian and Russian jets hit areas in Syria's northwestern province of Idlib. (RFE/RL, 12.02.19)
• Russian warplanes dropped bombs on two compounds for displaced Syrians over the past summer, killing up to 59 people in total. (New York Times, 12.01.19, The Moscow Times, 12.02.19)
• Three Russian military police officers were hurt in a blast from a homemade bomb on Dec. 2 as they carried out a routine patrol in Syria near the border with Turkey. (Reuters, 12.02.19)

Cyber security:

• U.S. and British law enforcement officials announced charges Dec. 5 against two Russian nationals they believe responsible for separate global hacking schemes that deployed some of the largest pieces of malware ever seen to swipe tens of millions of dollars from the bank accounts of unsuspecting victims. Officials identified those charged as Maksim Yakubets of Moscow and Igor Turashev of Yoshkar-Ola, Russia. Simultaneously, the U.S. Treasury Department announced sanctions against Yakubets and his Evil Corp, which is behind the widespread use of a multifunctional malware package that has harvested online banking credentials from infected computers in more than 40 countries. (New York Times, 12.04.19, RFE/RL, 12.05.19)
  • Russia’s foreign ministry said Dec. 6 that new U.S. sanctions against Russian individuals and firms over alleged cyber crimes were a “propaganda attack” and Moscow would respond to them, though it did not say how. (Reuters, 12.06.19)
• On Nov. 18, a U.N. committee passed a Russia-backed cybercrime resolution by a vote of 88 to 58, with 34 countries abstaining. Russia, Belarus, Cambodia, China, Iran, Myanmar, Nicaragua, Syria and Venezuela sponsored the resolution, titled "Countering the use of information and communications technologies for criminal purposes." The U.S. said it is "disappointed with the decision." (The Washington Post, 12.04.19)
• The FBI is treating any mobile app that comes out of Russia as a “potential counterintelligence threat,” the U.S.’s top law enforcement agency said in a letter to Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer. (Bloomberg, 12.04.19)
• Russia will force tech companies to pre-install Russian-made government-approved applications and software onto new smartphones from next year. (The Moscow Times, 12.02.19)

Elections interference:

• The Kremlin said on Dec. 3 it viewed suggestions from Western researchers that Russian hackers may have leaked British-U.S. trade documents before Britain's election with derision, saying such allegations were often a ploy to deflect attention. The opposition Labour Party said on Nov. 27 that the classified documents showed the ruling Conservatives were plotting to offer up the state-run National Health Service for sale in trade talks with Washington. (Reuters, 12.03.19)
• Researchers at the NATO Strategic Communication Center of Excellence said in a report released on Dec. 6 that social-media manipulation has become the new front line for antagonists seeking to influence elections, polarize public opinion and sidetrack legitimate political discussions. (RFE/RL, 12.06.19)

Energy exports:

• OPEC and allies including Russia agreed deeper than anticipated production cuts on Dec. 6 as producer nations seek to prop up crude prices in the coming months. Cuts will tally around 1.7 million barrels per day (b/d), an increase of around 500,000 b/d from a prior deal for 1.2 million b/d in curbs that expires in March 2020. (Financial Times, 12.06.19)
• Russia has begun gas supplies to China via the Power of Siberia pipeline, the largest gas project in its history. Dubbed “the contract of the century” by Russian gas group Gazprom, the $55 billion deal with China’s oil and gas major CNPC will eventually allow for 38 billion cubic meters in annual gas supplies to China via the 3,000 kilometer pipeline that crosses Siberia to the Chinese border in the south-east. (Financial Times, 12.02.19)
• The price Europe pays for Russian gas fell to its lowest level in 15 years, according to Gazprom’s accounts, released on Dec. 3. In the third quarter, the average price per thousand cubic meters, taking into account excise tax and customs duties, amounted to $169.8. (bne IntelliNews, 12.03.19)
• U.S. President Donald Trump has repeatedly criticized the Russian-German pipeline project called Nord Stream 2. But Trump's administration is failing to stop the pipeline due to an internal struggle inside his Cabinet: Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has been urging the president not to move forward with the sanctions. (The Washington Post, 12.04.19)
• Ukrainian oil transit company “Ukrtransnafta” and Russian “Transneft” have signed a 10-year agreement guaranteeing oil transit through Ukrainian pipelines for at least the next decade. This agreement means the resumption of oil transit after its suspension in April 2019 by Russia in response to claims of contamination by European buyers. (Kyiv Post, 12.04.19)
• Ukrainian and Russian ministers extended talks for a new natural gas supply contract though Ukraine at a bilateral meeting in Vienna on Nov. 28, Ukraine's energy ministry said in a press release that day. (bne IntelliNews, 12.02.19)
• Russian President Vladimir Putin accused Bulgaria on Dec. 4 of deliberately delaying the building of Russia’s TurkStream natural gas pipeline on its territory and said Moscow could find ways to bypass Sofia if needed. (Reuters, 05.04.19)
• Serbian President Alexander Vucic says his country has almost completed construction of its section of the TurkStream pipeline to carry Russian natural gas under the Black Sea, bypassing Ukraine. (RFE/RL, 12.04.19)

Bilateral economic ties:

• No significant developments.

Other bilateral issues:

• U.S. President Donald Trump has routinely communicated with his personal lawyer, Rudolph Giuliani, and other individuals speaking on cellphones vulnerable to monitoring by Russian and other foreign intelligence services, current and former U.S. officials said. (The Washington Post, 12.06.19)
• At a hearing on Russia sanctions in the U.S. Senate, Sen. Bob Menendez, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, admitted that sanctions against Russia could have “spillover effects.” Sen. Rand Paul told the hearing that sanctions have not changed Russia’s behavior to date and that Washington should “reconsider” how it structures them. (RFE/RL, 12.04.19)
• U.S. federal prosecutors have charged Russian, Italian and U.S. companies and several employees for allegedly attempting to evade U.S. sanctions that were imposed after Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 to try to import a U.S.-made power turbine into Russia. (RFE/RL, 12.04.19)
• The U.S. Embassy in Moscow failed to issue visas to a Russian delegation of treasury officials who were due to attend an international audit management conference in Washington on Dec. 3, the Russian Embassy in Washington said. (Reuters, 12.03.19)
• The top U.S. envoy in Moscow has expressed concerns about the "deteriorating health" of Paul Whelan, a U.S. citizen charged in Russia with espionage and detained since his arrest nearly a year ago. The embassy then rejected a Russian claim that Whelan is feigning illness and lying about his ill treatment in custody to draw attention to his case. (RFE/RL, 11.28.19, RFE/RL, 12.03.19)
• Victor Sheymov, a KGB officer who defected from the Soviet Union, died in the U.S. at the age of 73. (The Washington Post, 12.05.19)
• On Nov. 25, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov met with former special assistant to the U.S. president on Russian affairs Thomas Graham. Opinions were exchanged on current issues of bilateral relations. They also touched on some international and regional issues. (Russian Foreign Ministry, 11.25.19)

II. Russia’s domestic news

Politics, economy and energy:

• The World Bank, in a regular report on the Russian economy, said it expected gross domestic product to expand by 1.2 percent this year, up from the 1.0 percent it projected in October. In 2018, Russian GDP grew by 2.3 percent. In 2020, Russian GDP is seen at 1.6 percent and in 2021 1.8 percent, versus 1.7 percent and 1.8 percent respectively projected in October, the World Bank said. (Reuters, 12.05.19)
• In 2017, the average Russian citizen was 1.8 times wealthier than in 2000. But despite strong growth, Russia's per capita wealth is still only about a quarter than in OECD countries. If Russia’s human capital continues to grow at its 2000–2017 average rate of 3.5 percent, it will take about 50 years to catch up with the OECD. (World Bank, 12.05.19)
• Russia’s IHS Markit Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index tumbled to 45.6 in November, down from 47.2 in October—the worst performance across the Russian manufacturing sector for over a decade. (bne IntelliNews, 12.02.19)
• Russian state nuclear agency Rosatom has confirmed it will take a stake in transport conglomerate Delo Group as part of Russia’s plans to capitalize on Arctic shipping routes. (The Moscow Times, 12.03.19)
• Nineteen passengers died when a bus skidded off a bridge in Russia's far east on Dec. 1 and plunged into a river. (The Moscow Times, 12.02.19)
• In the past year, a record 37,000 people have died from HIV-related illnesses in Russia. The number of people living with HIV in Russia has surpassed 1 million. (The Moscow Times, 12.02.19)
• One in five Russians are willing to take part in mass political demonstrations, a new poll by Levada shows. (RFE/RL, 12.02.19)
• A Moscow court gave student and political blogger Yegor Zhukov a three-year suspended sentence Dec. 6, allowing him to avoid imprisonment after one of the most high-profile trials stemming from this summer’s wave of anti-government rallies. Authorities dropped the blogger's mass unrest charges and instead charged him with calling for extremism online. (The Moscow Times, 12.06.19)
• Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a bill that amends an existing law on media outlets deemed "foreign agents." The new law gives the authorities the power to label reporters who work for organizations officially listed as "foreign agents" as foreign agents themselves. (RFE/RL, 12.03.19)
• The leader of the Russian Orthodox Church and several Kremlin officials fly on a $43 million jet linked to major state lender VTB bank, The Bell business website reported Dec. 6. The Gulfstream jet was registered with the same San Marino offshore that operated the jets flown by Svetlana Medvedeva and VTB CEO Andrei Kostin’s alleged partner, journalist Nailya Asker-Zade, the outlet reported. Medvedev’s wife jetsets on the government’s dime, prominent Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny alleged. He also accused Kostin of showering Asker-Zade with gifts so lavish that they seemingly could only have been paid for out of government coffers: a $4 million mansion, a 200-foot yacht and $470,000 in private jet flights in one month alone. (The Moscow Times, 12.06.19, New York Times, 12.04.19, The Moscow Times, 12.04.19)
• Russian sport needs a "serious change" in its leadership starting with the firing of all its athletics coaches, the country's top anti-doping official said Dec. 6 as Russia braces for a four-year Olympic ban for flouting anti-doping rules. (The Moscow Times, 12.06.19)
• The number of Russian language learners has fallen from 74.6 million in the early 1990s to 38.2 million in 2018, according to state estimates cited by the RBC news website. (The Moscow Times, 11.29.19)
• Moscow has been named the world’s leading city destination in 2019 by tourism industry standard the World Travel Awards. The Russian capital saw off tough competition from a list including New York, Rio de Janeiro and Sydney, as well as the British and French capitals. (The Moscow Times, 11.29.19)

Defense and aerospace:

• In a few weeks, Russia will declare that the first Avangard regiment has achieved initial operational capability (starting with two missiles). (The Moscow Times, 12.02.19)
• Russia's MiG-31K interceptor jet carried out a test of the Kinjal hypersonic missile in Russia's part of the Arctic earlier this month. (Reuters, 12.01.19)
• On Nov. 28, Russia’s Strategic Rocket Forces conducted a successful launch of a Topol ICBM from the test site in Kapustin Yar toward the Sary-Shagan test site in Kazakhstan. (Russian strategic nuclear forces, 11.28.19)
• The Russian naval forces have in 2019 added a total of 23 new surface vessels, including service and supply ships, two new submarines, three aircrafts, four coastal missile complexes and 400 units of various missile and torpedo weapons. (Barents Observer, 12.06.19)

Security, law-enforcement and justice:

• A St. Petersburg resident has been detained after leading four South Asian migrants across a fake border crossing he had set up near Russia’s border with Finland, Interfax reported Dec. 3. (The Moscow Times, 12.04.19)
• Andrey Kaganskikh, a journalist for MBK Media, has found that access to Moscow’s surveillance cameras—and their new facial recognition technology—is being sold on the black market. (Meduza, 12.05.19)

III. Foreign affairs, trade and investment

Russia’s general foreign policy and relations with “far abroad” countries:

• Libya’s internationally recognized government plans to present a list of up to 800 Russian mercenaries fighting for its opponents to Russian officials. (AP, 12.05.19)
• Russia’s Defense Ministry said it has supplied small arms to the Central African nation of Gabon to help it combat poaching. (The Moscow Times, 11.29.19)

China:

• “The United States and some other Western countries have increased their interference in the internal affairs of China and Russia, threatened the sovereign security of the two countries and impeded their economic and social development,” Chinese President Xi Jinping said at a meeting with Russian security council secretary Nikolai Patrushev in Beijing on Dec. 2. He said that China and Russia must cooperate to “safeguard their core interests and the common security of the two countries, and maintain regional and world peace and stability.” (South China Morning Post, 12.03.19)
• Construction of the first road bridge to connect Russia and China has been completed, with the structure expected to officially open in the spring of 2020, Russian officials say. (RFE/RL, 11.30.19)
• “If this …. continues for another five or seven years, probably by the late 2020s, we could see something that could be properly called a de facto military alliance between China and Russia,” said Artyom Lukin, a researcher with the School of Regional and International Studies at the Far Eastern Federal University in Vladivostok. (South China Morning Post, 12.03.19)

Ukraine:

• Two Ukrainian soldiers were killed during a combat mission in the eastern Donetsk region on Dec. 1, the Ukrainian military said in a Facebook post. (RFE/RL, 12.01.19)
• Ukraine and Russia have reached the final stages of an all-for-all prisoner exchange agreement ahead of a key peace summit in December. (The Moscow Times, 11.28.19)
• Ukrainian presidential aide Andriy Yermak said Ukraine would wall off the rest of the country from occupied territories if Russia failed to agree to a ceasefire and prisoner swap at the Normandy Format summit in Paris next week. (Reuters, 12.05.19)
• "The French and Germans are pushing on Ukraine. There's no doubt about it," said one senior NATO diplomat, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal alliance discussions. "We're concerned that they'll try to twist Zelensky's arm to accept solutions that are unacceptable." (The Washington Post, 12.04.19)
• The Dutch Public Prosecution Service has accused Russia of allowing Volodymyr Tsemakh to evade its investigation into the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 by not arresting him and letting this suspect return to separatist-held territory in eastern Ukraine. (RFE/RL, 12.03.19)
• Ukraine’s parliament on Dec. 3 passed a law that revamps the State Bureau of Investigations on the same day that authorities detained a close associate of the corruption-fighting agency’s chief for allegedly demanding a $150,000 bribe from a construction company. (RFE/RL, 12.03.19)
• The National Bank of Ukraine for the first time directly accused oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky of orchestrating a sustained campaign of physical attacks and “terror” intimidation against the bank’s current and former staff. (bne IntelliNews, 11.28.19)
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has denied in an interview with several magazines that there had been a quid-pro-quo deal with U.S. President Donald Trump to investigate the latter's political rival, ex-vice president Joe Biden, and his son. (RFE/RL, 12.02.19)
• Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi, has instructed the legislative chamber’s Judiciary Committee chairman to draft articles of impeachment against U.S. President Donald Trump for his alleged pressuring of Ukraine to investigate a political rival. (RFE/RL, 12.05.19)
• Democrats signaled their impeachment case will include multiple alleged offenses in Trump's dealings with Ukraine, including bribery, abuse of power and obstruction of both Congress and justice, at a Judiciary Committee hearing that marked the next phase in the impeachment inquiry. (Wall Street Journal, 12.04.19)
• Andriy Kobolyev, CEO of Ukrainian state-run Naftogaz, became the company's second executive to be questioned by U.S. prosecutors as part of their probe into Rudy Giuliani. The U.S. Justice Department is investigating whether Giuliani violated federal lobbying and campaign-finance laws. (RFE/RL, 12.05.19)
• Rudy Giuliani visited Kyiv in an effort to gather testimony that would support his client, U.S. President Donald Trump, as impeachment proceedings against Trump gather pace in Washington. Ukrainian lawmaker Andriy Derkach said on Dec. 5 that he had been holding meetings with Giuliani to discuss the creation of an interparliamentary group to fight corruption and the misuse of U.S. funds by Kyiv. (RFE/RL, 12.06.19, Financial Times, 12.05.19)

Russia’s other post-Soviet neighbors:

• Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has reaffirmed his country's commitment to a strategic partnership with Russia, though there are no talks currently on establishing a joint parliament. Lukashenko's speech comes as he is scheduled to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin on Dec. 7-8 to discuss further integration within the Russia-Belarus Union State. (RFE/RL, 12.05.19) 
• “We’re currently working on creating a single parliament and government [with Russia],” Belarussian Ambassador to Russia Vladimir Semashko told the country’s independent news website tut.by Nov. 29. Under the new structure, Moscow and Minsk’s sovereign lawmakers and ministers will ‘surrender certain binding governing functions higher up,’” Semashko said without elaborating. (The Moscow Times, 12.02.19)
• Belarus and Russia have taken a step closer to forming a single market, based on the same principles as the EU, after Belarusian Ambassador to Russia Vladimir Semashko said Belarus' President Alexander Lukashenko and Russian President Vladimir Putin have signed off on a single parliament and merged many aspects of the two economies, Belsat reported on Dec. 1. (bne IntelliNews, 12.01.19)
• “First, we don’t call what happened in Crimea annexation. What happened happened. Annexation is too heavy a word to apply to Crimea,” Kazakh President Kassym Jomart-Tokayev said. “Second, there was no fear” that Russia could annex parts of northern Kazakhstan, Tokayev said in an interview. (The Moscow Times, 12.04.19)
• Former Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambaev has gone on trial behind closed doors, charged with illegally releasing a jailed organized crime boss in 2013, his defense lawyers say. (RFE/RL, 11.29.19)
• Azerbaijan's National Assembly, dominated by the ruling New Azerbaijan Party, has approved a proposal to dissolve parliament and ask President Ilham Aliyev, the leader of the party, to call snap general polls. Aliyev then signed an order setting parliamentary elections for Feb. 9. (RFE/RL, 12.02.19, RFE/RL, 12.05.19)
• U.S. Sen. Kevin Cramer has blocked a resolution that would've officially recognized the killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire at the beginning of the 20th century as genocide. (RFE/RL, 12.05.19)
• Armenian authorities have brought corruption charges against Serzh Sarkisian, the former president who was toppled during last year's "Velvet Revolution." (RFE/RL, 12.04.19)

IV. Quoteworthy

• “We can live on like this 20 years, even more ... And then ... an even sharper decline in the living standards and our ranking in the world will occur, and it will be much more difficult for us to keep this large territory unified,” Audit Chamber head Alexei Kudrin said when calling for systemic reforms in Russia during a civil society forum last week. (Nezavismaya Gazeta, 12.02.19, Russia Matters, 12.02.19)
• “If Mr. Macron gets grumpy about the internet in Paris, he can call Mountain View. There are only three people in the world who can make a local phone call—Mr. Xi, Mr. Trump, and Mr. Putin,” a person close to Yandex said. (Financial Times, 12.05.19)