This Week’s Highlights:

• U.S. media have reported that the CIA in 2017 extracted a Russian who provided top-secret intelligence on Russian President Vladimir Putin, including information about alleged Russian meddling in the U.S. 2016 presidential election, RFE/RL reports. The informant was reportedly outside Putin’s inner circle, but had access to high-level Kremlin decision-making—easily making the source one of the agency’s most valuable assets, according to the New York Times.
• During the third U.S. Democratic presidential debate among the top 10 candidates, Russia received no mentions and Russian President Vladimir Putin only one.
• Russia and Ukraine exchanged several dozen prisoners Sept. 7 as they moved to dial down tensions in a swap that included captured Ukrainian sailors and a suspect in the 2014 downing of a Malaysia Airlines plane. Thirty-five from each side were involved in the handovers, The Washington Post reports. French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian hailed “a new state of mind” in relations between Russia and Ukraine and called for the end of distrust between the Kremlin and the rest of Europe, but stopped short of suggesting EU sanctions on Moscow could be eased, according to Reuters.
• Russia’s ruling party has lost more than a third of its seats in Moscow’s city council as angry voters delivered a strong rebuke to Russian President Vladimir Putin after a summer of discontent in the country’s capital, Financial Times reports. But in 12 other regions that held legislative elections, United Russia retained strong majorities, another reflection of how Russian regional politics hew very differently than Moscow politics, RFE/RL reports.
• Russia’s net public debt has fallen to zero for the first time since the introduction of sanctions and the collapse of oil prices, reports RBC.
• Russia is cautiously optimistic about the exit of U.S. national security adviser John Bolton. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov does not expect Moscow's ties with Washington to improve overnight. Dmitry Novikov, the first deputy chairman of the Russian State Duma's committee on international affairs, called the move “positive news," according to The Moscow Times.

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

Nuclear security and safety:

• Russia’s floating nuclear power plant, the Akademik Lomonosov, has arrived at its remote Arctic destination after sailing 4,700 kilometers from Murmansk. The vessel will now plug in at the port of Pevek, in Chukotka across the Bering Strait from Alaska. (Bellona, 09.10.19)
• Russia’s environmental ministry has warned that the country is heating twice as fast as the rest of the world just days before Moscow is expected to sign the Paris Climate Accord. Melting permafrost in the Russian Arctic could release radioactive substances, the ministry warned, while Siberian forests are increasingly prone to fires and the Far East to flash floods. (Bellona, 09.06.19)
• An inspection by the Murmansk prosecutor’s office revealed insufficient anti-terrorist measures at three Murmansk nuclear waste sites, Kommersant reported. (The Barents Observer, 09.12.19)

North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs:

• No significant developments.

Iran’s nuclear program and related issues:

• No significant developments.

New Cold War/saber rattling:

• No significant developments.

Military issues, including NATO-Russia relations:

• The Pentagon is taking money from construction projects across Europe designed to help allies deter a possible attack from Russia to pay for U.S. President Donald Trump’s border wall. Roughly $770 million will be taken from projects in allied European nations. (The Washington Post, 09.04.18)
• In a survey released by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs American respondents ranked Russia as the ninth most pressing threat to U.S. interests (tied with immigrants and refugees) and China as the 11th most pressing threat (tied with the rise of authoritarianism). Whereas 95 percent of foreign policy elites would seek retaliation in the case of a Russian attack on a NATO ally, according to a recent Eurasia Group Foundation survey, only 54 percent of the public would do the same. (Foreign Affairs, 09.09.19)
• The U.S. State Department has approved the sale of 32 F-35 Joint Strike Fighters to NATO ally Poland in an estimated $6.5 billion order. The deal should allow the U.S.-made fighter jets to gradually replace Poland’s fleet of Mikoyan MiG-29 and Sukhoi Su-22 jets, both Russian-made. (The Washington Post, 09.11.19)

Missile defense:

• No significant developments.

Nuclear arms control:

• No significant developments.

Counter-terrorism:

• U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan told Oleg Syromolotov, the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister for antiterrorism matters, in Vienna that dialogue between the two countries "must achieve concrete results to benefit U.S. national security and advance mutual interests by enhancing reciprocal information sharing." A U.S. State Department statement after the meeting stated that both sides "discussed trends in the movements of foreign terrorist fighters."(RFE/RL, 09.10.19)
• About 12,000 terrorist fighters have migrated from Syria to Iraq and are trying to destabilize this country, Russian Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Konstantin Kosachyov said at a meeting with Iraqi Deputy Foreign Minister Muayad Saleh. (Interfax, 09.10.19)
• U.S. President Donald Trump has issued an executive order making it easier for the U.S. administration to impose sanctions on suspected terrorists, their financiers and their supporters. (RFE/RL, 09.11.19)

Conflict in Syria:

• Airstrikes hit a part of northwest Syria for the first time since a ceasefire was declared 10 days ago, a war monitor and rebel group spokesman said on Sept. 10. Syrian government forces and their Russian allies unilaterally agreed a truce on Aug. 31 in opposition-controlled Idlib, where a “de-escalation zone” was brokered two years ago. The intense airstrikes by Russian and Syrian warplanes that had accompanied a Syrian government push to re-take the area had stopped, although there has been ground fighting and shelling. The Russian Defense Ministry denied Sept. 10 that Russian warplanes had carried out strikes in the ceasefire zone. More airstrikes hit the south of Syria's Idlib region on Sept. 12, a rebel official and residents said. (Independent, 09.10.19, Xinhua, 09.10.19, Reuters, 09.12.19)
• Airstrikes by U.S.-led coalition forces in Syria have killed or wounded many civilians, indicating that required precautions were ignored and war crimes may have been committed, U.N. investigators said Sept. 11. Syrian government and allied Russian warplanes are also conducting a deadly campaign that appears to target medical facilities, schools, markets and farmland and which may also amount to war crimes, the report by the U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Syria said. (Reuters, 09.12.19)
• The Pentagon is preparing to send about 150 troops to northeastern Syria to conduct ground patrols with Turkish forces, reversing at least temporarily a withdrawal from Syria that President Trump ordered last December. (New York Times, 09.12.19)
• Russian President Vladimir Putin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met in Sochi on Sept. 12. Netanyahu told Putin that coordination with Russia's military was important because of the presence of Russian forces in Syria. Netanyahu told Putin "over the past month we have seen a sharp increase in Iran's attempts to use the territory of Syria to attack us" and that Israel must be allowed to act freely against Iran. (RFE/RL, 09.12.19, Reuters, 09.12.19)

Cyber security:

• No significant developments.

Elections interference:

• Former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice asked whether Russian meddling swung the 2016 election, Sept. 11: “I don’t think there is any evidence of that. And you know I really don’t think that that’s a good conversation to have. I think that really does devalue the people in Wisconsin and Michigan and others who decided to vote for President Trump.” (Wall Street Journal, 09.11.19)
• A federal judge on Sept. 10 set sentencing for Dec. 18 for U.S. President Donald Trump's former national security adviser Michael Flynn as prosecutors said they reserved the option of seeking prison time for Flynn, which would reverse an earlier recommendation of probation. (The Washington Post, 09.11.19)

Energy exports:

• Russian President Vladimir Putin told Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller that he wanted to see deliveries of natural gas from the Yamal Peninsula to China. A new delivery route can be developed through Mongolia, Putin said. (The Barents Observer, 09.11.19)
• Gazprom says it is analyzing the legal and commercial consequences of a Sept. 10 court ruling that reduced gas flows via the Opal pipeline, which connects Germany with the Nord Stream pipeline. The ruling reinstated curbs on gas flows through Opal, half-owned by Gazprom, to 35 percent of the capacity of Germany's onshore pipeline extension of Nord Stream 1. (RFE/RL, 09.11.19)
• OPEC and its non-cartel allies on Sept. 12 discussed further cuts to oil production and the possibility of Iran re-entering the global market but said that any decision would have to wait for a meeting in December. (AP, 09.12.19)
• The U.S. oil industry is struggling to attract finances and raise its output and its output growth will slow, Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said on Sept. 12 in Abu Dhabi. “With regard to the possibility developing relations with the minister of energy for the United States, I am in contact with him, we are always ready to develop a dialogue on energy between our countries,” Novak said. “But the ball isn’t in our court.” (Reuters, 09.12.19, CNBC, 09.12.19)

Bilateral economic ties:

• No significant developments.

Other bilateral issues:

• U.S. media have reported that the CIA in 2017 extracted a Russian who provided top-secret intelligence on Russian President Vladimir Putin, including information about alleged Russian meddling in the U.S. 2016 presidential election. (RFE/RL, 09.10.19)
  • CNN reported that the decision to move the person out of Russia was fueled by U.S. intelligence concerns that U.S. President Donald Trump may have leaked classified information to Russian officials, including during a May 2017 White House meeting. (RFE/RL, 09.10.19)
  • The informant, according to people familiar with the matter, was outside Putin’s inner circle, but saw him regularly and had access to high-level Kremlin decision-making—easily making the source one of the agency’s most valuable assets. (New York Times, 09.11.19)
  • The alleged U.S. spy could be Oleg Smolenkov, an official with Putin’s administration, Kommersant reported Sept. 10, citing anonymous social media channels and past media coverage. Smolenkov had been a longtime trusted assistant of Yury Ushakov—a senior foreign policy aide to Putin—dating back to Ushakov's years as Russian ambassador to the U.S. “This is serious,” an unnamed official told Kommersant regarding the level of access the informant could have had to secret information. (The Moscow Times, 09.10.19)
  • Diplomatic records show that Smolenkov worked as a "second secretary" in the Russian Embassy from at least 2006 until 2008. (The Washington Post, 09.11.19)
  • Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said separately on Sept. 10 he had never heard of Oleg Smolenkov. "I have never seen this man, have never met him and have never monitored his career or movements," Lavrov said. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov condemned as lies and slander suggestions that a suspected CIA mole in the presidential administration had handed over information to the U.S. about alleged Russian meddling in the U.S. presidential elections. (Reuters , 09.11.19)
  • Russian officials who had allowed the rumored CIA informant to violate a travel ban and subsequently flee to the U.S. have been “punished,” Interfax reported, citing an unnamed official familiar with the situation. (The Moscow Times, 09.13.19)
  • Russia has asked the United States via Interpol to confirm the whereabouts of the former Kremlin official, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Sept. 12. (Reuters, 09.12.19)
  • No one answered when an RFE/RL reporter rang the doorbell of 78 Partridge Lane in Stafford, Virginia, listed in public records as being owned by Smolenkov. (RFE/RL, 09.10.19)
• Russia is cautiously optimistic about the exit of U.S. national security adviser John Bolton. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov does not expect Moscow's ties with Washington to improve overnight. Dmitry Novikov, the first deputy chairman of the Russian State Duma's committee on international affairs, called the move “positive news." (The Moscow Times, 09.11.19)
• During the third U.S. Democratic presidential debate among the top 10 candidates, Russia received no mentions and Russian President Vladimir Putin only one. (Russia Matters, 09.13.19)
  • U.S. Sen. Cory Booker during the third Democratic presidential debate: “This is a president [Donald Trump] that has a better relationship with dictators, like Duterte and Putin, than he does with Merkel and Macron.” (The Washington Post, 09.13.19)
• Russian state oil major Rosneft said Sept. 10 that attempts to curb its business in Venezuela would be illegal and that the U.S. was using the threat of sanctions as a form of unfair competition. The U.S. could impose sanctions on Rosneft “at some point,” U.S. special envoy to Venezuela Elliott Abrams said Sept. 10. (The Moscow Times , 09.11.19)
• An official with the U.S. Agency for International Development on Sept. 12 in Warsaw described a new American effort to help democratic institutions withstand Kremlin interference in targeted countries. USAID calls the effort “Countering Malign Kremlin Influence” and describes it as a framework to help countries including Georgia, Ukraine and Moldova protect their elections, counter propaganda and avoid energy dependence on Russia. (AP, 09.12.19)
• Two high-ranking regional officers in Russia's Investigative Committee have been banned from entering the U.S. for alleged "gross violations of human rights." Vladimir Yermolayev, head of the Investigative Committee in the city of Surgut, and Stepan Tkach, a senior investigator, are suspected of leading a group of Surgut Investigative Committee officers in subjecting at least seven Jehovah's Witnesses "to suffocation, electric shocks and severe beatings during interrogation." (RFE/RL, 09.11.19)
• Valentin Gapontsev, a Soviet-born scientist with Russian and U.S. citizenship, is the first person to get his name taken off the U.S. Treasury Department’s so-called "Russian Oligarch" list following a 20-month lobbying effort and court fight in Washington. (RFE/RL, 09.12.19)
• Members of Congress are demanding the Russian government immediately release Paul Whelan, an American jailed for months on espionage charges. (AP, 09.12.19)

II. Russia’s domestic news

Politics, economy and energy:

• Over 3,000 election campaigns culminated across Russia on Sept. 8, with 16 regions electing governors, a dozen electing legislatures and hundreds of municipal races held. (RFE/RL, 09.09.19)
  • Russia’s ruling party has lost more than a third of its seats in Moscow’s city council as angry voters delivered a strong rebuke to Russian President Vladimir Putin after a summer of discontent in the country’s capital. Candidates backed by a broad opposition movement were set to claim 20 of Moscow city council’s 45 seats, according to official election data on Sept. 9, with candidates backed by United Russia, the ruling party, winning 24. At the last election in 2014, the party won 38 seats including 10 won by independent candidates it backed. (Financial Times, 09.09.19)
  • United Russia suffered a noteworthy blow in the regions on Sept. 8. In the Khabarovsk region, on the Pacific coast, the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) scored a resounding victory in the election for the regional legislature, reportedly winning 34 or 35 seats. Like the other main political parties, the LDPR Democrats almost always vote the Kremlin line. But it’s still a rejection of the ruling party. In the other 12 regions that held legislative elections, United Russia retained strong majorities, another reflection of how the Russian regional politics hew very differently than Moscow politics.  (RFE/RL, 09.09.19)
  • United Russia’s share of the vote in Sevastopol has fallen by 39 percent, from 77 percent in 2014 to 38 percent on Sept. 8. The results mark the second-largest decline in votes for United Russia in the country. Only in the Kharbavarosk region did United Russia lose a bigger proportion of the vote, suffering a 45 percent decrease in votes from 2014. (The Moscow Times, 09.11.19)
  • While suffering setbacks in Moscow and Khabarovsk, the Kremlin retained most of its seats in other key cities that voted for local parliaments, showing how the opposition movement hasn't so far gained a significant foothold outside the capital. (Wall Street Journal, 09.09.19)
  • In 16 regions where elections for governor or administrative executive were held, all incumbents were decisively reelected; all were either United Russia candidates or nominally-independent-but-in-fact-United Russia-affiliated candidates. Prior to the Sept. 8 vote, all had been effectively appointed to their positions, in acting capacity, by the Kremlin. (RFE/RL, 09.09.19)
  • Russia's communications regulator has accused U.S. tech giants Google and Facebook of violating legislation prohibiting political advertising during elections. Responding to the accusations, Google said Sept. 9 that it supported "responsible political advertising" that complies with local legislation. Facebook said that advertisers—not the company itself—were responsible for complying with local election laws. (RFE/RL, 09.09.19)
  • Hundreds of protesters gathered in Far East Russia on Sept. 9 to demand a re-run of the Sept. 8 local election won by a pro-Kremlin candidate and to call for the release of an anti-Putin shaman’s supporters. Igor Shutenkov won 52.25 percent of the votes in the republic of Buryatia’s administrative center of Ulan-Ude, beating the Communist Party senator who had criticized police violence during protests in Moscow this summer. At least 17 protesters were detained Sept. 10 after security officials threw a smoke grenade into the bus they were in. (The Moscow Times, 09.10.19, The Moscow Times, 09.12.19)
• Security officials have carried out searches in five of opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s regional offices across Russia, days after local elections where he urged supporters to vote strategically against Kremlin-aligned incumbents. Russian police raided the homes and offices of his supporters in 43 cities on Sept. 12, his close allies said. So far, more than 200 raids have taken place across Russia. (The Moscow Times, 09.10.19, AP, 09.12.19)
• Police in St. Petersburg have been filmed dragging a local election monitor out of a building as observers accuse officials in Russia’s second-largest city of staging the “dirtiest” campaign in the country. (The Moscow Times, 09.13.19)
• Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sept. 12 visited the town of Botlikh in the southern Russian republic of Dagestan. (Reuters, 09.13.19)
• A judge in the trial of Russian theater director Kirill Serebrennikov and his co-defendants wants to send the controversial embezzlement case back to prosecutors. (RFE/RL, 09.11.19)
• Russia has planted its flag on the northernmost tip of Eurasia to symbolize Russia's desire to peacefully explore and develop the Arctic, the Northern Fleet said. The steel construction was erected on Cape Fligely, located at 81.5 degrees north on Rudolf Island in the remote archipelago of Franz Josef Land. (The Barents Observer, 09.13.19)
• Hundreds have bid farewell to Udmurt scholar Albert Razin, who died after he lit himself on fire in protest against Russia's language policies in the capital of the Volga region of Udmurtia. Razin was holding two signs reading "If my language dies tomorrow then I'm ready to die today" and "Do I have a Fatherland?" Human Rights Watch (HRW) is urging Moscow to address the "deep-rooted problems" facing ethnic and linguistic minorities in the country. (RFE/RL, 09.12.19, RFE/RL, 09.13.19)
• Russia’s net public debt has fallen to zero for the first time since the introduction of sanctions and the collapse of oil prices, reports RBC. As of Aug.1 the total state debt was 16.2 trillion rubles ($248 billion) or 15 percent of GDP and equivalent to what the government takes in each year in total as taxes. The amount the state has in cash in deposits with the central bank was 17.6 trillion rubles on the same date, or 16.2 percent of GDP. (bne Intellinews, 09.11.19)
• Of all bank loans in Russia last year, 70 percent were provided by state-run banks, up from around 64 percent in 2016. (Wall Street Journal, 09.11.19)
• The Russian central bank's monetary policy chief said on Sept. 12 that he does not rule out that 2019 inflation will be below 4 percent. (Reuters, 09.12.19)
• Russia has the world’s third-highest suicide rate, the World Health Organization said Sept. 9 in a global study published ahead of World Suicide Prevention Day. Lack of economic prospects, as well as cultural and spiritual emptiness, are the two leading causes of suicide, according to Temyr Hagurov, a leading researcher at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Sociology. (The Moscow Times, 09.11.19)
• Nearly one-third of Russia’s population has come face-to-face with domestic violence in their own families or among acquaintances. According to the Levada Center polling agency, 31 percent of Russian respondents have encountered domestic violence—either in their social circles (19 percent), between their parents (7 percent) or in their own families (5 percent). (The Moscow Times, 09.13.19)

Defense and aerospace:

• In the course of the Center-2019 exercise, the focus will be on ensuring security in Central Asia. Around 128,000 troops will participate in the exercise, using more than 20,000 units of arms and equipment, around 600 aircraft and up to 15 ships. Servicemen from China, Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan, India, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan will take part. The Center-2019 exercise will proceed in two stages. The first will focus on anti-terrorist operations, aerial threat neutralization and reconnaissance and defense. At the second stage, the troops will launch an offensive for routing the simulated enemy. (TASS, 09.09.19)
• The Russian and Belarusian militaries have launched weeklong joint exercises in the Nizni Novgorod region, west of Moscow. The Union Shield 2019 drills are set to involve a total of 12,000 troops and 950 pieces of military equipment, including combat vehicles, aircraft and helicopters. (RFE/RL, 09.13.19)

Security, law-enforcement and justice:

• Russia’s state finance watchdog has placed popular YouTube blogger Yegor Zhukov accused of “mass unrest” during Moscow’s recent election protests on its list of extremists ahead of his trial. (The Moscow Times, 09.12.19)

III. Foreign affairs, trade and investment

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

• "The time has come, the time is right, to work towards reducing the distrust between Russia and Europe, who ought to be partners on a strategic and economic level," French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said in Moscow after the first Russian-French Security Cooperation Council since the annexation of Crimea. Le Drian hailed “a new state of mind” in relations between Russia and Ukraine and called for the end of distrust between the Kremlin and the rest of Europe, but stopped short of suggesting EU sanctions on Moscow could be eased. He ruled out imminent discussions on lifting EU sanctions against Moscow imposed over Crimea Le Drian and Florence Parly of France and Russia’s Sergei Lavrov and Sergei Shoigu on Sept. 9 held the first meeting in the so-called "2+2" format that was suspended after Russia seized Crimea. (RFE/RL, 09.09.19, Reuters, 09.09.19, Financial Times, 09.09.19)
• In separate talks before the French and Russian defense and foreign ministers gathered for joint discussions, Sergei Shoigu, Russia’s defense minister, told his French counterpart Florence Parly that France and Russia should seek “fresh impetus to our relations in the strategic [military] area.” The two countries’ armed forces would work together to stop militants from Syria reaching north Africa, Shoigu said, noting that they had “acknowledged similarity between our agencies’ views on ways to curb these threats and outlined practical measures to co-ordinate joint efforts.” (Financial Times, 09.09.19)
• A burst of diplomatic activity by French president Emmanuel Macron to repair the EU’s frayed relations with Moscow has triggered alarm in other European capitals, where suspicion of Russian leader Vladimir Putin runs deep. Some of France’s allies—notably Germany, the Netherlands, Poland and the Baltic states—are wary, and several want to maintain or reinforce EU sanctions against Russia imposed over Crimea. (Financial Times, 09.11.19)
• The EU is prolonging sanctions against scores of Russian and Crimean officials as well as companies and groups accused of undermining Ukraine’s sovereignty and independence. EU headquarters said in a statement Sept. 11 that asset freezes and travel bans against 170 people and 44 “entities,” including militias and banks, will be extended for six months until March 15, 2020. (AP, 09.12.19)
• Russia warned Europe’s human rights tribunal it risks opening a “Pandora’s Box” of politically motivated cases if it accepts Ukraine’s claims that Moscow-led forces committed atrocities in the Crimea. (Bloomberg, 09.11.19)
• The EU’s envoy to Moscow has called for a sweeping expansion of engagement with Russia in fields including 5G mobile communications and personal data protection, in a move likely to stoke divisions within the bloc over how to deal with the Kremlin. (Financial Times, 09.13.19)
• Russia condemned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's plan to annex the Jordan Valley ahead of a meeting between the Israeli leader and President Vladimir Putin later on Sept. 12, warning it could sharply increase regional tensions. (Reuters, 09.12.19)
• Russian President Vladimir Putin has said at the start of talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the Kremlin has an interest in who wins Israel’s parliamentary election next week. The two met in Sochi on Sept. 12. Putin noted that more than 1.5 million immigrants from former Soviet republics now live in Israel. "We always considered them our people, compatriots. And, of course, we are not indifferent to what kind of people will come into the Israeli parliament," Putin said. Netanyahu was also expected to meet with Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu. (RFE/RL, 09.12.19)
• Russia was behind the murder last month of former Chechen rebel Zelimkhan Khangoshvili in Germany, U.S. officials said on Sept. 10, rekindling concerns that Moscow is ramping up an assassination campaign against the country's perceived enemies abroad. (Wall Street Journal, 09.11.19)
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his Saudi counterpart Ibrahim Al-Assaf discussed bilateral cooperation in a telephone call on Sept. 9, including Russian President Vladimir Putin's upcoming visit to Saudi Arabia in October, as well as Syria, Yemen and the situation in the Persian Gulf, the Russian Foreign Ministry said. (Interfax, 09.09.19)
• Prosecutors charged the head of Bulgarian non-governmental organization National Russophile Movement on Sept. 10 with spying for Russia as part of a scheme they said aimed to draw Bulgaria away from its Western allies and towards Moscow. The investigation is not intended to influence relations with Moscow, Bulgairan Prime Minister Boyko Borissov said. (The Moscow Times, 09.11.19, Reuters, 09.11.19)
• Influential Russian oligarch Konstantin Malofeyev has been banned from entering Bulgaria for 10 years in connection with the Balkan country’s Russian spy scandal. (RFE/RL, 09.11.19)
• Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto told the Financial Times last week that it was “very difficult to imagine a solution” to crises such as in Syria or Libya in which Russia was “not somehow an active partner.” (Financial Times, 09.08.19)
• A Prague district assembly vote to remove a statue of wartime Soviet Marshal Ivan Konev has sparked a diplomatic row between Russia and the Czech Republic. (RFE/RL, 09.13.19)

China

• Russian bank VTB is in talks with Chinese companies over a potential investment in energy-to-aluminium group EN+. (Financial Times, 09.08.19)
• Dozens of activists have rallied in Kazakhstan's southwestern town of Zhanaozen for the seventh day, protesting against Chinese investments and industrial projects as Kazakh President Qasym-Zhomart Tokaev is getting ready to pay an official two-day visit to Beijing. (RFE/RL, 09.09.19)

Ukraine:

• Russia and Ukraine exchanged several dozen prisoners Sept. 7 as they moved to dial down tensions in a swap that included captured Ukrainian sailors and a suspect in the 2014 downing of a Malaysia Airlines plane. Thirty-five from each side were involved in the handovers, which had been highly anticipated and came less than four months after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy took office promising to open fresh channels of dialogue with Moscow.  (The Washington Post, 09.09.19)
  • Following a phone call between Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskiy and Russian President Vladimir Putin after the swap was concluded, the Kremlin said the detainee deal was of “great importance for the normalization and improvement of bilateral relations.” (Financial Times, 09.08.19)
  • German Chancellor Angela Merkel declared the prisoners’ return home a “sign of hope.”  (Financial Times, 09.08.19)
  • Linas Linkevicius, Lithuania’s foreign minister, tweeted that while it was “important that Ukrainian political prisoners are at last home” it had “regrettably [come] at a price of the key witness in the MH17 downing case.” (Financial Times, 09.08.19)
  • Kurt Volker, U.S. special envoy to Ukraine, tweeted that he was “very pleased” to see the prisoner exchange—but he also made clear Washington expected more from Putin. “[I] hope [this] builds momentum for further prisoner exchanges, renewed ceasefire and progress toward full Minsk implementation,” Volker wrote.  (Financial Times, 09.08.19)
  • Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov says Moscow is not ruling out a second prisoner swap with Ukraine. (RFE/RL, 09.13.19)
• The Trump administration on Sept. 12 released $250 million in military aid to Ukraine that had been held up despite criticism that the money was desperately needed to deter Russian aggression and territorial expansion. Ukraine's president said Sept. 13 that the U.S. will also extend an additional $140 million. (AP, 09.12.19, AP, 09.13.19)
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy will visit the U.S. on Sept. 23 to attend the U.N. General Assembly in New York. Zelenskiy said on Sept. 13 he expects to meet U.S. President Donald Trump in September and that peace talks to resolve Ukraine's conflict with Russia in the eastern Donbass region will also take place this month. (RFE/RL, 09.10.19, Reuters, 09.13.19)
• After abruptly pulling the previous American ambassador out of Kyiv when conservatives questioned her political loyalty, U.S. President Donald Trump has yet to nominate a successor. Behind the scenes, Trump has told aides that he sees Ukraine as corrupt and suggested that he harbored a grudge from what he saw as that nation's support for Hillary Clinton in 2016. (New York Times, 09.10.19)
• Ukraine is preparing a roadmap with clear deadlines in order to implement a peace deal for eastern Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told reporters Sept. 12. Zelenskiy hoped that the new roadmap would be discussed at a meeting in the so-called "Normandy" format between the leaders of Ukraine, Russia, Germany and France in September. (Reuters, 09.12.19)
• Ukrainian and Russian officials are discussing the possible "liberation" of 113 Ukrainian nationals jailed in Russia, according to Ukrainian ombudswoman Lyudmyla Denisova. (RFE/RL, 09.10.19)
• France is in favor of convening a Normandy format summit in Paris within the next few days, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said. (Interfax, 09.10.19)
• Police have raided the headquarters of PrivatBank, Ukraine's largest bank, as part of a criminal investigation the same day that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) arrived for talks on starting a new lending program. (RFE/RL, 09.11.19)
• Ukraine's parliament has adopted a bill spelling out procedures for a presidential impeachment. Under the new legislation, parliament first initiates impeachment proceedings, which must be approved by the Constitutional Court and the Supreme Court, and then passed by three-quarters of lawmakers. (RFE/RL, 09.10.19)
• Gas experts from Russia, Ukraine and the EU will meet Sept. 19 in Brussels to negotiate a renewal of Gazprom’s 10-year, trans-Ukraine transit contract, which expires on Jan. 1. (Ukraine Business News, 09.10.19)
• Russia has denied transit permits to 60 percent of Kazakh coal that was supposed to cross Russia last summer on its way to Ukraine. (Ukraine Business News, 09.10.19)
• Ukraine's former central bank chief, Valeria Hontareva, says she is not ruling out the possibility of applying for political asylum in Britain, where she currently resides after experiencing an alleged hit-and-run attack and her daughter-in-law’s car being set on fire. (RFE/RL, 09.10.19)

Russia’s other post-Soviet neighbors:

• Moldova's president said Russia will cut the price for natural gas sold to his country starting Oct. 1. Igor Dodon made the comment in a post to his Facebook page after meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin on Sept. 7. (RFE/RL, 09.07.19)
• Moldovan Foreign Minister Nicolae Popescu has said during a visit to Moscow that the government in Chisinau will not revise its agreements with the European Union and NATO. (RFE/RL, 09.11.19)
• The Russian Embassy in Estonia is seeking additional information from authorities in Tallinn after learning on Sept. 11 that a Russian national only identified as A.A. was recently sentenced to five years in prison for espionage. (RFE/RL, 09.12.19)
• Abkhazia's incumbent separatist leader Raul Khajimba has rejected opposition demands for a new presidential election after disputing the results of a runoff in the breakaway Georgian region that gave him a slim victory. (RFE/RL, 09.11.19)
• A Russian soldier has been found dead in an Armenian city where Russia has a military base, Armenian investigators told the state-run TASS news agency. He is at least the third known Russian soldier who has been killed in Armenia in the past four years. (The Moscow Times, 09.11.19)
• Three Kyrgyz nationals have received prison terms for their roles in a high-profile rape case that sparked mass protests and attacks against Central Asian labor migrants in Russia's Far Eastern region of Sakha-Yakutia in March. (RFE/RL, 09.12.19)
• A court in Bishkek has started the retrial of two Kyrgyz opposition politicians, Omurbek Tekebaev and Duishonkul Chotonov, who had been transferred to house arrest in late August after their convictions were struck down. (RFE/RL, 09.12.19)
• The Uzbek government has officially applied for membership in the Council of Cooperation of Turkic-speaking Countries, also known as the Turkic Council. (RFE/RL, 09.13.19)
• A Tajik government source says Syrian refugee camps currently house at least 575 Tajik women and children whose families had joined the Islamic State (IS) militant group. (RFE/RL, 09.12.19)

IV. Quoteworthy

• No significant developments.