of massive demonstrations that protested fraudulent elections and eventually toppled authoritarian and

semi-authoritarian regimes in Georgia in 2003,Ukraine in 2004,and Kyrgyzstan in [Link] each case,the

successor regime was less favorably inclined toward Russia than its [Link] the Ukrainian case,in
particular,Putin had taken an open stance in support of the side that was [Link] officials began
to speak of the civic groups as instruments of subversion directed by Western intelligence
[Link] security officers described a conspiracy of loosely associated entities engaging in
“network warfare.” In response,a law was passed in December 2005 requiring all nongovernmental
organizations to register with the state and to submit regular reports on their activities and [Link]
state was empowered to review compliance and to shut down any entity that violated the rules,but
exactly which activities were prohibited was left [Link] more ominous was the sudden rise of a
new organization,a pro-Putin youth movement called Nashi (“Ours”).Founded in March 2005,Nashi was
capable of mobilizing 60,000 people for a rally in May of that [Link] leaders described the group’s
purpose as preventing a coup against the Russian [Link] Kremlin denied any links to the
organization,but Nashi was permitted to hold its founding congress in a facility of the Russian Academy
of Sciences,and its leaders were granted a personal interview with [Link] rhetoric suggested to some
observers that Nashi was being readied to replace an insufficiently reliable United Russia party as the
country’s main political [Link] of the Future? Boris Yeltsin,in his revolution,unleashed a
host of competing regional,bureaucratic,political,and economic [Link] he attempted to rule by
playing them off against one [Link] informal interplay,backroom power struggles,deals,and
personal connections often proved more important than the formal institutions of government,which he
had also created in an arbitrary and self-serving [Link],however,ill health,depression,and
bouts of drinking kept him from engaging the [Link] system became increasingly [Link] then
set out to impose order and hierarchy by subordinating institutions and privatesector groups to the
[Link] the positive side,few people believe anymore that Russia faces the threat of
economic,social,or political [Link] country under Putin is still much freer than it was as part of the
Soviet [Link] is more open,and it has more human contact and a freer flow of ideas with the outside
[Link] is more responsive to the wishes of its [Link] still are regular elections,and civil society
survives,although it faces new [Link] debate continues in the print [Link] it depends too
heavily on favorable international oil prices,the economy continues to show signs of [Link]’s
efforts to impose hierarchy could simply [Link] is,in a word,[Link],there have been
undeniable negative [Link] turmoil of the 1990s discredited the words “reform” and “democrat” in
the eyes of many honest [Link] reached intolerable [Link] Soviet Union’s collapse,the
loss of superpower status,the subsequent rise of poverty,and the perceived mistreatment at the hands
of other powers left a reservoir of resentment and latent hostility that may be looking for an [Link]
brutal war in Chechnya gives little cause for satisfaction with either side,even when the Russians say it is
part of the common fight against [Link] the nature of Russia’s more competitive manufactured
exports may give some cause for [Link] stifling of the electronic media,the virtual renationalization
of certain large enterprises,the abolishing of gubernatorial elections,and the concentration of power in
the hands of the president all give an insight into the fragility of some of the country’s most important
[Link] government,moreover,has shown a disturbing willingness to criminalize political
[Link] if these actions are supposed to be temporary,or are simply intended to rein in the
excesses of a chaotic time and reestablish order,there is still a risk that they could go too [Link]’s
administration was initially associated with economic recovery,but the perceived assault on private
property,the partial reinsertion of the state into the economy,and the simultaneous rigidification of the
state could easily stifle investment,encourage capital flight,generate bottlenecks,and otherwise induce
economic erosion in the longer [Link] is,of course,too soon to draw any serious conclusions about the
history of the Russian Federation since [Link] trends finally emerge as dominant will have long-
lasting consequences for the future of Russia and perhaps the rest of the world as [Link] also Soviet
Union,dissolution of [Link] reading:Billington,James [Link] in Search of
[Link],DC:Woodrow Wilson Center Press,2004;Herspring,Dale R.,[Link]’s Russia:Past
Imperfect,Future Uncertain.2d [Link] York:Rowman and Littlefield,2005;Jack,[Link] Putin’s
[Link] York:Oxford University Press,2004;Ross,Cameron,[Link] Politics Under [Link]
York:Manchester University Press,2004;Shevtsova,[Link]’s Russia.2d [Link],DC:Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace,[Link] [Link] Rwanda/Burundi conflict Rwanda and Burundi
were,until World War I,occupied by the Germans,being a part of German East [Link] by the
Allied armed forces,they were administered as Ruanda-Urundi by Belgium under League of Nations
trusteeship and,from 1945,under United Nations (UN)[Link] entity was split in 1959 into
Burundi and Rwanda,and on July 1,1962,the two countries became independent with the formation of
the Kingdom of Burundi and the Republic of [Link] faced regular ethnic problems centering on
the Tutsi-Hutu rivalry,with the Hutu forming 85 percent of the population of each country and the Tutsi
being a much better educated [Link] the year before Burundi became independent,there was
political trouble that followed the UNsupervised elections of September 1961 that saw the Parti de
l’Unité et Progrès National winning but their leader,Prince Louis Rwagsore,being assassinated several
weeks [Link] was more instability when two prime ministers,Pierre Ngendandumwe and Joseph
Bamina,were assassinated before an attempted coup d’état took place in October [Link] were
killed as the government sought to maintain its [Link],it gave too much power to the
army,which,in November 1966,overthrew the monarchy and established a republic under President
Michel [Link] last former king,Ntare [Link],staged a coup attempt in 1972 but was killed in
the attempt,which was immediately blamed on the Hutu—the government being drawn from the Tutsi
[Link] the Tutsi government sought revenge on its opponents,some 100,000 Hutu were
[Link] 1976 Micombero was overthrown in a military coup,and the new president,Jean-Baptiste
Bagaza,tried to moderate the government and introduce reforms that stopped the oppression of the
[Link],Bagaza was overthrown in 1987 in a coup d’état organized by Major Pierre Buyoya,who
suspended the 1981 constitution and dissolved opposition [Link] August 1988 some 20,000 Hutu
were massacred by the government,and many Hutu refugees fled to [Link] Rwanda,the monarchy
was removed in 1959,before independence,and at independence,in 1962,the Hutu-led Parti du
Mouvement de l’Emancipation Hutu—led by Grégoire Kayibanda—came to [Link] were massacres
of some 20,000 Tutsi,and in 1973 Kayibanda was overthrown by General Juvénal Habyarimana,a former
defense minister,who became [Link] formed the Mouvement Révolutionnaire National pour le
Dé[Link] was not until 1978 that the constitution was restored;Habyarimana was relected in
1983 and again in January [Link] was the 1988 ethnic tensions in Burundi that sent large numbers of
Hutu refugees from Burundi across the RwandaBurundi [Link] Tutsis also settled in Uganda,where
they became Anglophiles,in contrast with the Rwandan and Burundi governments,which maintained
connections with [Link] in both countries came to a brief halt,and in April 1994,when
negotiations to end the fighting were starting to make progress,the plane carrying Habyarimana back to
Kigali,the Rwandan capital,was shot down with a French [Link] on board,including President
Ntaryamira of Burundi,were [Link] was the opportunity that the extreme Rwandan Hutus were
eagerly awaiting to try to take over control of [Link] is not known for certain who shot down the
plane,but the Hutu government of Rwanda blamed the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF)—Tutsi rebels who
were based in Uganda—while the RPF blamed the hard-liners in the government who did not want to
share [Link] killing of the president gave the extreme Hutus an excuse to unleash their Interahamwe
militia on the Tutsis and moderate Hutus,killing up to 900,000 of them in horrific [Link] UN
solders were killed while protecting moderate politicians in Kigali,and the remainder of the UN forces
was evacuated from Rwanda/Burundi confict 379 the [Link] UN Security Council—Rwanda was a
member at the time—did nothing to try to stop the genocide,which only ended as the RPF forces won
the civil war,capturing Kigali soon [Link] RPF inherited a devastated country and did their best to
arrest the perpetrators of the genocide but hundreds of thousands of Hutus—extremists and their
supporters—fled into the neighboring Democratic Republic of the [Link] the coming to power of
the government of President Paul Kagame in Rwanda,there has been a concerted effort to rebuild the
country shattered by ethnic tensions,war,and [Link] a large number of the intelligentsia of the
country murdered or in exile overseas,Kagame has managed gradually to rebuild the infrastructure of
the country and at the same time prosecute those guilty of horrendous [Link] United Nations
Security Council did adopt Resolution 977 in February 1995,setting up the International Criminal Tribunal
based in [Link] Kagame government has objected to it because it has refused to sanction the
death penalty even for the most heinous of [Link] of those caught in Rwanda,in some cases
having been found guilty of murdering hundreds of people with machetes,have been tried and
executed,with others [Link] spite of the tensions and hatreds engendered by the war,the civil society is
gradually being improved in Rwanda,with conditions also improving in [Link] to the recent civil
war,many tourists had visited Rwanda to see the mountain [Link] numbers had increased
following the film Gorillas in the Mist (1988)about Dian Fossey who lived with the gorillas and nurtured
many of them,especially one known as “Digit.” After the war it was revealed that most of the gorillas
survived,and some tourist groups are,once again,visiting [Link]
reading:Mamdani,[Link] Victims Become Killers:Colonialism,Nativism,and the Genocide In
[Link],NJ:Princeton University Press,2001;Omaar,Rakiya,and Alex de
[Link]:Death,Despair and [Link]:African Rights,1995;Twagilimana,[Link] Debris
of Ham:Ethnicity,Regionalism,and the 1994 Rwandan [Link],MD:University Press of
America,[Link] 2002 Winter Olympic Games were held at Salt Lake City,[Link] choice of Salt Lake
City saw accusations of corruption and bribery that had first occurred following Atlanta being awarded
the Olympics in 1989.A number of members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC)were found to
have received bribes in exchange for their votes,with files held in Salt Lake City revealing demands for
and expectations of bribes by IOC delegates being made [Link] a similar story,during the pairs figure
skating competition,a judge was accused of collusion in awarding the gold medal to the Russian pair over
the Canadian skaters;the situation was resolved when both figure skating pairs were awarded the [Link]
2004 the Summer Olympic Games were held at Athens,Greece,the site of the first of the modern
Olympic Games held in [Link] games witnessed several scandals,the majority of them involving
performanceenhancing [Link] least 20 violations were noted,the most of any Olympic [Link]
issue of athletes taking drugs to gain an edge over rivals has become one of the dominant concerns of
the games in the 21st [Link] addition,the International Olympic Committee must also deal with the
issue of letting professional athletes into a competition that was originally designed just for
[Link] critics contend that allowing professional athletes will give developed nations an unfair
advantage over underdeveloped nations,while others contend that the records set at the Olympics will
mean little unless the best athletes are allowed to [Link] these challenges—and the ever-
present fear of terrorist attacks—the Athens Games saw a record 202 nations participate with over
11,000 [Link] Olympic Games have proved to be a tempting avenue for nations to express a
political point of view,or in more drastic fashion,commit violence in the name of one cause or
[Link] the intrusion of politics,it is perhaps a testament to de Coubertin’s dream that athletes
the world over still strive together in peaceful competition along the ideals expressed in the Olympic
motto:Citius,Altius,Fortius (Faster,Higher,Stronger).Further reading:Findling,John E.,and Kimberley
[Link] Dictionary of the Modern Olympic [Link],CT.:Greenwood
Press,1996;Gordon,[Link] and the Olympic Games:The Official [Link]:University of
Queensland Press,1994;The Olympic Games,Athens 1896—Athens 2004 :All the Athletes,Events and
Results Since [Link]:Dorling Kindersley,2004;Wallechinsky,[Link] Complete Book of the
[Link]:Penguin Books,1984;Young,David [Link] Modern Olympics:A Struggle for
[Link]:Johns Hopkins University Press,[Link] Corfield Organization of American States
(OAS)The Organization of American States (OAS)was founded on April 30,1948,in Bogotá,Colombia,by 21
member [Link] organization to the PanAmerican Union (1889–1947)and retooled to
correspond to the changed security environment of the post–World War II era,the OAS was founded as a
regional agency of the United [Link] purposes,according to its official charter,are “to strengthen the
peace and security of the continent;to promote and consolidate representative democracy,with due
respect for the principle of non-intervention;to seek the solution of political,juridical,and economic
problems ...;[and] to eradicate extreme poverty,” among [Link] in Washington,D.C.,since
its founding,in 2007 the OAS counted 35 member states,with Cuba suspended from participation since
1962,making 34 active member [Link] the organizational structures of the United Nations,the
OAS is governed by a General Assembly and Permanent Council and led by a secretary-general elected
every five [Link] has numerous affiliated organizations,organs,and entities,including the InterAmerican
Commission on Human Rights (IACHR,f.1959);the Inter-American Drug Abuse Control Commission
(CICAD,f.1968);Inter-American Committee Against Terrorism (CICTE,f.1999);and many [Link]
“Protocols” introduced major revisions to the original OAS Bogotá Charter:the Protocols of Buenos Aires
(1967),Cartagena de Indias (1985),Washington (1992),and Managua (1993).In 1994 the OAS organized
the first Summit of the Americas,an event henceforth held every few [Link] its founding,the OAS
has been dominated by the United [Link] the the cold war era,its overriding concern was limiting
Soviet and communist influence in the Western [Link] Marxist,communist,and socialist
doctrines proved popular in many parts of Latin America in the postwar era,OAS member states could
pursue one of three options:openly defy the United States and adopt a socialist or Organization of
American States 327 Marxist-oriented government;ally with the United States in its anticommunist
policies;or pursue a “third way” by aligning with neither the Soviet nor the [Link] a handful of
instances,OAS member states openly defied the United States,such as in Guatemala (1944–54),Bolivia
(1952–64),Cuba (1961– ),Chile (1970–73),Nicaragua (1979–90),Grenada (1983),Panama (1989),and
Venezuela (1999– ).In these and other cases,the United States violated the OAS charter regarding
nonintervention,which stipulated that “No State or group of States has the right to intervene,directly or
indirectly,for any reason whatever,in the internal or external affairs of any other State” (Chapter
IV,Article 19).More often,OAS member states cooperated with [Link] efforts or sought to
pursue a nonaligned stance in international [Link] United States most commonly interpreted the
latter as alignment with international communism and therefore a direct threat to its national [Link]
the post–cold war era,the OAS has exerted a greater degree of autonomy from [Link] also
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato);Warsaw [Link] reading:Shaw,Carolyn
[Link],Conflict,and Consensus in the Organization of American [Link] York:Palgrave
Macmillan,2004;Sheinin,[Link] Organization of American [Link]:ABC-CLIO,[Link]
[Link] Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)The Organization of Petroleum
Exporting Countries (OPEC)was established in [Link] first meeting was held in 1961,and,beginning in
1965,it was headquartered in [Link] charter members included Venezuela,Iran,Iraq,Kuwait,and
Saudi [Link] Allah al-Tariki,the Saudi director of petroleum affairs,played a leading role in the
organization’s [Link] membership was later expanded to include
Libya,Algeria,Indonesia,Qatar,Nigeria,UAR,Gabon,and [Link] 1968 the major Arab oil-producing
nations formed OAPEC (Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries).OPEC members met on a
regular basis to set quotas for production;however,the organization lacked the mechanism to enforce the
quotas,which were frequently ignored or openly flouted by individual producing [Link] with
large populations such as Iran,Algeria,and Nigeria tended to push for price [Link] with small
populations and lesser economic domestic demands preferred stable [Link] of their production
capacity and huge reserves,Saudi Arabia and Kuwait were able to increase production to prevent price
increases or to keep prices [Link] the 1980s Saudi Arabia’s proven oil reserves contained over 168 billion
barrels,Kuwait had over 66 billion barrels,and Iraq had 43 billion barrels,as compared to 27.3 billion
barrels in the United [Link] the 1980s the United States was also importing over half its oil,as
compared to only 25 percent in the early [Link] 1970 the new revolutionary government in Libya
under Muammar Qaddafi forced production cuts to secure higher [Link] petroleum companies—
dominated by the so-called seven sisters,Western-owned corporations—bitterly opposed such pressure
tactics,but because of ever-increasing demands they ultimately agreed to Libyan [Link] rest of the
oil-producing nations soon followed suit and secured similar [Link] price of oil then rose from
$2 to $3 per barrel and then to $5 per [Link] the peak of the oil boom in the 1970s Sheik Ahmad
Zaki Yamani,secretary-general of OPEC from 1968 to 1969,served as the Saudi Arabian minister of
[Link] the 1973 Arab-Israeli War King Faysal in Saudi Arabia was persuaded to use oil as a
weapon,and cuts in supplies to those nations supporting Israel were [Link],Faysal was a
staunch anticommunist,and,when the United States and Egyptian president Anwar el-Sadat argued that
the oil boycott could increase the threat of communism in the Arab and Muslim world,King Faysal
effectively ended the boycott by withdrawing Saudi support in [Link] 1986,when Yamani supported
raising oil prices,King Fahd removed him from [Link] its huge reserves Saudi Arabia,and,to a lesser
extent,Kuwait,could force price modifications by simply increasing [Link] 1996 Saudi Arabia had
become the world’s largest petroleum [Link] the Iran-Iraq War Kuwait began to flood the
market,exceeding its quota and driving down [Link] lower prices hurt Iraq at the very time that it
was desperately trying to increase revenues to rebuild its economy;this was a contributing factor in the
Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990 and the resulting First 328 Organization of Petroleum Exporting
Countries Gulf [Link] prices,largely caused by high production by the Arab Gulf states and Saudi
Arabia,also contributed to Ecuador’s withdrawal from OPEC in [Link] to increased demand by
burgeoning Indian and Chinese economies and ongoing wars in Afghanistan and the Middle East,the
price of oil reached $60 per barrel in 2006 and prices continued to [Link] prices resulted in huge
profits for Western oil companies as well as for the oil-producing [Link] one quarter of 2006 Exxon-
Mobil,the world’s largest petroleum corporation,posted profits of over $7 [Link] governments
talked about cost control measures,alternative