These are the days of our Spring discontent. It is ironic to consider that as events continue to unfold in Crimea the path that might hold the most hope for future peace and stability is the one that guarantees all sides being at least somewhat disappointed. Allow me to elaborate:
 
    
Why Ukraine should be…

Elections in Serbia 2014 - Options without Choice

It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.
Joseph Stalin


Immediately after the release of the first relevant results of the elections in Serbia, began comparing the new parliamentary…

By Anton Tsvetov
 
Face it. We still live in a world of power politics, barking upon the wrong tree, while global threats creep from behind.
 

 
What is the main difference between a child and an adult?
 
If you ask me, I would say the ability to embrace delayed gratification. A child would chose to have a candy right…

 
Vladimir Putin’s annexation of Crimea has enraged the West. His lack of openness to any compromise has forced it to launch a — weak — sanctions regime. Putin finds this ‘unacceptable’ and threatens retaliation. 
 
In yesterday’s speech — which many noted might have been his most important…

The U.S. is going to chair the Arctic Council in 2015. This prospect, together with the current open confrontation in Ukraine, raises some questions concerning the future of U.S.-Russia cooperation in the Arctic. We asked Pavel Gudev, Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO) of the Russian Academy of…

Game structure
 
 
By design, the game is implemented in two stages. At stage 1, Ukraine and Russia choose levels of financial transfers and military involvement not knowing each other’s choice. At stage 2, Crimean voters observe the levels chosen and opt for the preferred country. Does it sound familiar? Hopefully so, because the…

If ever since the ouster of Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi in the summer of 2013, Saudi Arabia and Qatar have increasingly come to clash over their divergent and often antagonistic foreign policies in the Middle East, recent weeks have seen the unravelling of decades of political and regional alliances. At a time when the entire Arab world finds…

Having invaded Crimea, set up a puppet government and organised a sham referendum, now Vladimir Putin will have to facilitate the region’s accession to Russia. There is little doubt this is going to happen swiftly. Any different reaction to yesterday’s clear, if unfair, results, will seem much too cynical even to Russians, who now &mdash…

March 16, 2014 marks the day when the people of Crimea go to the voting booths to decide whether they will be part of Ukraine or part of Russia. While the referendum is no doubt important to people living in Crimea, I for one remain highly skeptical that the results will actually be the ultimate arbiter on the territorial decisions made about Crimea…

I have already written two more elaborate posts on the issue in Russian last year. You can find them here and here. 
 
As the new Game of Thrones season looms on the horizon it is time to figure out what does the saga teach us about law, morality and interest in world politics.
 
Much has been written on the not-so-accidental…

Game theory can say something non-trivial about any strategic interaction, and separatism movements are by no means an exception. In the following, I model the strife between Russian and Ukrainian governments over the Crimean Republic and Sevastopol as an extensive game with simultaneous moves which may supply us with verifiable predictions about…

I have some bad news for the United States. Russia doesn’t listen to America. Unfortunately, I have worse news: contrary to what many specialists, analysts, and commentators across the transatlantic community may think, it is not because Russia is trying to rekindle the Cold War or desperately grasping at whatever remnants of old Soviet power it…