Inside Russia and Eurasia

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Inside Russia and Eurasia
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THE TEAM

The editors and creators of Inside Russia & Eurasia - Andrew Wilson (UK) and Nina Bachkatov (Belgium) - have been reporting on Russia and its region for many years.

As an Associate Editor of 'The (London) Observer' Andrew Wilson dealt with coverage of the 1960-70s dissident movement and events preceding the 1985 rise to power of Mikhail Gorbachev. Earlier, as the newspaper's defence specialist, he analysed Soviet military developments and followed the quest for nuclear arms limitation culminating in the START treaties.

In 1986, shortly before the 27th Party Congress, he took over as the Observer's Moscow bureau, covering Mikhail Gorbachev's perestroika campaign, the rise of Boris Yeltsin, and events leading to the 1991 break-up of the Soviet Union. In 1990 he left to establish the European Press Agency.

In the 1950s, travelling in Afghanistan, he wrote the first published reports of Soviet involvement in the country, including the building of the Salang tunnel. His several books include North from Kabul (1961), The Bomb and the Computer (1968), War Gaming (1970), and The Disarmer's Handbook (1983).

In 1972 he was invited to give evidence to the US Congress on problems connected with the development of the Supersonic Transport. In 1980 he authored the Adelphi Paper No. 155, 'The Aegean Question', for the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

Nina Bachkatov was Moscow correspondent of the Belgian newspaper Le Soir from 1985 to 1990, and a frequent visitor and reporter during the preceding period. Her first book (on political-economic affairs in Belgium) was published in 1978.
Subsequently, with Andrew Wilson, she published Les Enfants de Gorbatchev (a study of Soviet youth in the mid-1980s), The Soviet Union A-Z (a dictionary of political and social changes under Gorbachev) and a study of the first Chechen war, Tchétchénie, Histoire d'un conflit.

She is a frequent contributor on Russian and CIS affairs to Le Monde Diplomatique, and a regular commentator on Belgian radio and television. She is also a much-demanded lecturer on Russian and FSU affairs, and frequent contributor to international relations symposia.

Nina Bachkatov and Andrew Wilson both split their time between their offices in Brussels and Moscow.

The general team of contributors to Inside Russia & Eurasia are by tradition anonymous, taking advantage of this status to express opinions independently of bodies for which they may otherwise work. However, 'outside' specialists and the editors may give occasionally give their names to imortant opinionated or analytical entries.

The team includes officials, academics and, occasionally, journalists, resident in Russia and Eurasia or extensively travelling in the region. All are recognised experts in their fields and fluent in one or more languages in the region.

The editors are always interested to hear from potential new contributors, especially university and other researchers, interested in putting forward fresh ideas or summarising published or unpublished papers.

We also welcome confidential contacts with members of official organisations having a private view on the way in which matters are being conducted in the field for which they work. Immediate contact can be made on any subject by pressing the Home Page 'react' button or by clicking here.


THE EUROPEAN PRESS AGENCY (EuroPA) Ltd.

The European Press Agency Ltd., publishers of Inside Russia & Eurasia, was incorporated in the United Kingdom on 23 September 1992. Although it is registered in England (no. 274829), its main editorial office and archive are in Belgium, at 109 rue Franklin, B-1000 Brussels. It also has an office in Moscow (at 12 Bolshaya Spasskaya, kv 46).

The Agency is self-supporting and wholly independent of any government, international agency, political movement, or charitable foundation. Its in-depth reporting and impartial analysis provides clients with an objective basis for assessing events regardless of theory or the fashionable consensus.

The founders were among the first Moscow-based journalists to recognise the character of the Gorbachev 'revolution' when Western official opinion remained sceptical of its direction. Similarly they were almost alone in giving early warning of the defects of his successor, Boris Yeltsin.

Subsequently the Agency was ahead of most others in exposing the corruption of Russia's privatisation programme, and, in Ukraine, the lack of purpose and cohesion required for building economically competitive democracy.
In the mid-1990s, ahead of strained US-Russian relations, it anticipated Yeltsin in coining the phrase 'cold peace', and warned of the shallowness of the economic 'miracle' that was to lead to the 1998 August crisis. In 2001 it was again early in explaining why President Putin could live with the consequences of a US withdrawal from the ABM treaty.

Another field in which it anticipated public recognition was the short-sightedness of Western support for Shevardnadze in Georgia.

The Agency keeps a 365-days-a-year watch on developments in its region of concern. The Brussels office continuously analyses material from all parts of Russia and the newly independent states. It also keeps close touch with sources and officials in the European Union and NATO involved in the development of relations with Russia and CIS countries.

The Moscow office is the base for reporting on Russian-Eurasian political, economic and social questions, and for travelling in other parts of the region. The Brussels office can be reached at any time:

by fax: +32 2 733 3469
by e-mail: editors@russia-eurasia.net

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