The U.S. and Global Security Review - Blog by Michael Novakhov

Putin and politics loom over the Pope and the Patriarch Saturday February 13 th , 2016  at  11:30 AM 1 Share Pope Francis and Patriarch Kiril exchange a document on religious unity in Havana on Friday. It is the first meeting between a pope and a Russian patriarch As the heads of the  Roman Catholic and Russian Orthodox  churches met on Friday for the first ever such meeting, their aides aimed to keep things simple. “We don’t want this to become a big political show,” said Father Alexander Volkov, spokesman for the Moscow patriarchate. And yet when Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill retreated into a room at Havana’s José Martí International airport  in a renewed attempt to mend a troubled relationship  that has split Christianity for almost a millennium, they had another man to thank, and a politician at that: Russian president Vladimir Putin. Alexander Andreev, Russia’s ambassador to the Vatican, told Russian newspaper Kommersant that “persona

Are Chechen Special Forces Fighting in Syria? Saturday February 13 th , 2016  at  9:43 AM 1 Share February 12, 2016 05:29 PM Age: 8 hrs Category: North Caucasus Analysis By:  Mairbek Vatchagaev After the Kremlin denied having ground troops in Syria, the Russian leadership was surprised by Ramzan Kadyrov’s statement that Chechen special forces were fighting in the Middle East against the Islamic State (IS). A trailer for a program produced by the Russian federal TV channel Rossiya 1 (Russia.tv, February 7) states that “Chechen special forces obtain information about the structure and the number of terrorists in the Islamic State and identify targets for Russian airstrikes” (Kommersant, February 8). Last October, Kadyrov did ask Russian President Vladimir Putin to dispatch his men to Syria to fight the Islamic State ( RIA Novosti , October 2, 2015), and it is likely that the Kremlin approved the Chechen ruler’s initiative. Kadyrov said in the Ross