Amidst strained relations between Armenia and Russia, Russia's state atomic energy company will modernize Armenia's nuclear power plant and presumably build a new unit.
In the years before independence, Stepnogorsk had become a key node in Moscow’s biological weapons program and uranium industry. Now it is one of many Kazakh provincial towns framed by its Soviet legacy.
Expanding Ashgabat’s dependence on China, visiting Iran, and talking north-south transportation links. This and more in our weekly Turkmenistan briefing.