By Jennifer J. Carroll This post was written at 11 a.m. Feb. 20, 2014 in Kyiv, Ukraine. Read Jennifer’s previous report on EuroMaidan here. I got up early Tuesday morning. A march on parliament had been planned to demand a return to the 2004 constitution — the constitution replaced six years later by a new one

This article is part of the Ellison Center blog Series on Sochi. Click here to read more as we cover the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Russia!    By Sarah McPhee “It’s like holding the Olympic Games in Kabul!” This description of Sochi by Russian policy analyst Arkady Ostrovsky only seems like irresponsible hyperbole. According

By Julianne Maila February 6 marked the first official visit of Zygimantas Pavilionis, Lithuanian Ambassador to the US and Mexico, to the city of Seattle. With a packed agenda, in three short days, Ambassador Pavilionis participated in a variety of events at UW and within the Seattle community. As one of the most distant American

This article is part of the Ellison Center blog Series on Sochi. Click here to read more as we cover the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Russia!    By Andrew Yarbrough For several months, countries and groups across the world have condemned the Russian anti-gay “propaganda” laws, a set of ill-defined legal jargon with the ignoble goal

By Jennifer J. Carroll Just a few short weeks ago, walking through the EuroMaidan encampment would bring me joy. In December and early January, it was an organic gathering of people filled with music, dancing, food, and art. There were children in costume, gathering choirs, and community building the likes of which I have never

by Jennifer Carroll Read Jennifer’s powerful stories of EuroMaidan here. (Click to scroll through photos.)  

By Veronica Muskheli Together with a few other Eastern European nations, Russians have a concept that is strange to Americans, the Old New Year. It is celebrated the night of January 13th to 14th because, according to the Julian-style Eastern Orthodox Church calendar, January 14th is actually January 1st. Russians, Georgians, Macedonians, and so forth, whether

by Taylor Zajicek Tucked just west of the Urals, Bashkortostan occupies the easternmost edge of European Russia. Despite being acquired by Ivan IV nearly 500 years ago, the minority republic retains and boasts its Turkic roots. The state-directed history of the region deemphasizes this imperial acquisition in favor of a narrative of diversity and multiethnic

by Christi Anne Hofland This article is based on a paper presented at the Nineteenth Annual Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies Northwest Conference in April 2013. Since independence in 1991, Ukraine has struggled with uncertainty as it attempts to solidify a national identity and forge a path for its future. One of its greatest

by Katie MacDonald Sitting together on the porch in the village of Chobogh, members of a rural Tajik family asked where I was from, if I liked Tajikistan, the cold weather in Seattle, if I made cow-patties to heat my family’s home there, and why I had my nose pierced. I joked that it was