Caucasus
Coverage across the South Caucasus — Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan.
Azeri Light clears $97, half again the oil price written into Baku's budget
Azerbaijan's export blend was priced at $97.61 a barrel on Wednesday morning, up $4.72 or 5.08% on the day, APA reported; the 2026 state budget was drawn at $65.
Baku's fuel for Armenia nears 20,000 tonnes, and every wagon still goes through Georgia
Another 17 tank wagons of Azerbaijani diesel leave Baku's Bilajari yard for the Georgian border today. The running total the Baku press prints, near 15,000 tonnes of diesel and 5,000 of petrol, is small against Armenia's import book and large as a fact: the peace dividend is counted in wagons, and its only track runs through a third country.
Khachatryan gets 2 months in the jail that already holds Kocharyan
A Yerevan court ordered Gagik Khachatryan, the former finance minister and tax chief, held for 2 months, Sputnik Armenia and Kommersant reported on Wednesday morning. He goes to the Yerevan-Kentron detention centre, where Robert Kocharyan has been since last week, and the Human Rights Defender has opened an inquiry over a video of him that circulated online.
Tbilisi asks a court to send its pardoned Russian back to Russia
The Migration Department filed a petition with Tbilisi City Court on Tuesday to expel Denis Kulanin to Russia, 2 days after the same court allowed him to leave for a third country. He is still in the migration centre with a ticket to Yerevan he cannot use.
Armenia's former tax chief is carried into court on a stretcher
Gagik Khachatryan, who ran the State Revenue Committee and then the finance ministry under Serzh Sargsyan, was taken from his home by Investigative Committee officers on Tuesday and delivered to court lying down. The detention is the milestone the new case opened on 29 August had been pointing to.
Pashinyan drops the referendum, and Putin offers to leave Gyumri
Four days after Lavrov told Armenia to choose between the EU and the EAEU by referendum, Pashinyan told Putin in Bishkek there will be no referendum and no membership decision yet. Putin answered at his press conference in Bishkek that the Gyumri base stays only if Armenians want it, and invited Pashinyan to Moscow to go through the file point by point. The ultimatum has become a negotiation with a venue.
A pardoned Russian's ticket out of Georgia expires in a migration cell
Denis Kulanin, released from a protest-case sentence by presidential pardon on 28 August, spent 1 September in Tbilisi's temporary migrant detention center while a ticket to Yerevan bought for him went unused. The migration service wants a court-ordered deportation, and voluntary exit is blocked until a judge rules.
Dushanbe and Yerevan agree to convene their economic commission
Rahmon and Pashinyan used the SCO sidelines in Bishkek to line up the next session of the Tajik-Armenian intergovernmental commission on trade and economic cooperation, with business forums to follow. No documents were signed.
Armenia opens a new case against the man who ran its taxes and treasury
The Investigative Committee announced a new criminal case against Gagik Khachatryan, a former finance minister and former head of the State Revenue Committee, and said he would be detained. Prosecutors want 210 properties, stakes in 29 companies and 33 billion drams, about $85 million, forfeited.
Aliyev and Pashinyan pace out the Trump route in Bishkek
Azerbaijan's president and Armenia's prime minister met on the margins of the SCO summit on 31 August and discussed what both readouts call further practical steps on the TRIPP corridor. For one afternoon the normalisation track between Baku and Yerevan ran through Kyrgyzstan.
Moscow packs a referendum for Bishkek
The Kremlin has named the topic Vladimir Putin brings to Nikol Pashinyan in Bishkek: the choice it wants Armenia to put to a vote.
Georgia's president pardons 9 from the protest cells
Mikheil Kavelashvili pardoned 9 people jailed across three waves of Georgian protest, from the 2024 marches against the foreign-agents law to last October's unrest, in an act the ruling party framed as answered petitions.
Lavrov answers the Kocharyan file with a referendum demand
Moscow's first comment above spokesperson level on Armenia's prosecuted ex-presidents arrived on Friday from Sergey Lavrov: the leadership in Yerevan is "guided by other tasks", the Eurasian membership on the table is worth $6 billion to $12 billion a year by his count, and the choice between Brussels and that union should go to a referendum without delay.
Baku protests images displayed at its Moscow compound
Azerbaijan's foreign ministry condemned "provocative images against our country" displayed by unknown persons outside its embassy's guest house in Moscow around midday Thursday, and asked Russia for a legal assessment of the act.
The ADB puts $400 million behind the region's border queues
The Asian Development Bank approved on Thursday a $400 million regional facility, BUILD, to modernise border crossings across the 11 CAREC countries, with up to $50 million per project over 10 years. The priority projects named so far are Tajik: Fotehobod-Oybek on the Uzbek border, Sarazm and Navbunyod.
Baku's media complaint goes on the record: 96 outlets
The number that reached the wires this week began as an interview. Azerbaijan's ambassador to Russia counted the Russian outlets running theses about his country at 96 or more, and asked Moscow for a political assessment and concrete measures. The count had circulated for days as a stray figure; now it has an author on the record.
Georgia's jailed ex-premier turns into a recruitment target
Irma Inashvili publicly invited Irakli Garibashvili to join her Alliance of Patriots: a political prisoner, in her reading, should answer with politics. The ruling party answers his letters from jail with one word, masquerade.
Two months for Kocharyan, ruled around a hospital bed
Armenia's Anti-Corruption Court granted the investigator's motion in full on Thursday morning: Robert Kocharyan, the country's second president, goes into detention for 2 months. The ruling landed while he lay in a hospital ward.
A second travel ban lands while Kocharyan waits for a judge
Day 2 of Armenia's presidential prosecutions brought a travel ban for Serzh Sargsyan, a courthouse transfer for Robert Kocharyan and a first word from Moscow: hope, minus the phone call.
Armenia's programme passes with one party's votes
The National Assembly adopted the government's 2026-2031 programme on Tuesday, 63 votes to 24. Every yes came from Civil Contract.