Kazakhstan is exploring its options. The government has embarked on a series of reforms, as yet mainly in the economic sphere, although reforms in the governance sector are also inevitable. They include slimming down the bloated state bureaucracy and also slowly re-calibrating Kazakh foreign policy to make it less dependant on Russia. The Russians are not amused, says Dennis Sammut in this op-ed

More than 20,000 Georgian servicemen have participated in the mission in Afghanistan since 2004, usually serving six monthly rotations.  Predominantly tasked with peacekeeping in the volatile Helmand province, Georgia was the largest non-NATO, as well as largest per-capita, contributor to ISAF mission. Dozens of Georgian soldiers were killed or injured during the Afghanistan operation.

The United States announced Thursday (20 May) sanctions against two senior leaders of the Houthi group in Yemen due to their role in continuing offensive in Marib, exacerbating the humanitarian situation and paralysing peace talks.

The campaign, Landmine Free South Caucasus, is a collaborative effort by organisations from Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia working with international partners to raise awareness of landmine issues in the region.

The European Council has expressed serious concern at the unprecedented scale of humanitarian needs, the shrinking of humanitarian space, and the growing funding gap.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov approached their first face-to-face meeting, which took place in Iceland on Wednesday (19 May), with caution, and gently started getting to know each other. The two senior diplomats have many more meetings in front of them as they try to adjust US-Russia relations.