Western sanctions against Moscow have led to a radical change in the Russian foreign policy course. The Western direction of Russia’s diplomacy, which had been promoted since the late 1980s, began to change at the end of the XX and at the beginning of the XXI centuries. Amid the Western pressure, Moscow began to give higher priority to the eastern direction, expanding political and economic contacts with non-Western states. Russia’s main attention was turned to the countries of the Eurasian area, for which the policy of the West also created significant risks. As a result, over the past decades, Moscow’s diplomacy has made a radical turnaround, establishing a new framework of economic relations and creating a solid foundation for the further development of political ties with the Eurasian states. Furthermore, in recent years, the forming of new ties with Eurasian countries has rapidly accelerated, primarily due to the worsening of the relations between Russia and the West. This factor provoked a fundamental revision of Moscow’s foreign policy, which was forced to respond to the confrontational course of the Western states. The article analyzes the main results that Russia has achieved in its relations with the Eurasian countries. The research concludes that the shift of Russian policy towards the Eurasian area has a long-term basis and meets the interests of Moscow.

The internationalization of the Ukrainian crisis and the “Ukrainization” of the international agenda have exposed the deep goals and strategic aspirations of the West, led by the United States, in modern geopolitics. The American strategic claim to organize the world order at its own discretion and the excessive conviction in its overestimated ability to be an unchanging world hegemon are causing a systemic failure. Its flip side is a sharp increase – through the prism of the events in Ukraine – in confrontational rhetoric and political, sanctions-economic and military-strategic activity against Russia, which have reached peak values. The Ukrainian crisis has become not only a bifurcation milestone in the development of world political processes, but also a new milestone in understanding and rethinking transformational shifts, divisions and isolations in global politics. Today, their unusually sharp critical assessments and conclusions are no longer isolated in the Western-centric discourse, which, we emphasize, have a tendency to increase in quantity and have a more clearly expressed qualitative content than before. Thus increasing the degree of predictive and evaluative accuracy of specialized analytical reflection, which initially assumes taking into account underestimated or, conversely, overestimated factors, circumstances and event flows in world politics.

The article is devoted to the changes in Iran’s foreign policy regarding Central Asia under the presidency of Ebrahim Raisi. The main attention is paid to Tehran’s “Eastern policy” and participation in Eurasian integration. The Central Asian countries play an important role in Iran’s Eurasian strategy. Since the disintegration of the Soviet Union, this region has become an arena where Russia, China, the United States and other powers compete for influence. Iran, due to its geographical location and historical ties with the region, aims to become one of the key players in the area. The research reveals shifts in Tehran’s foreign policy course, primarily in relation to the Eurasian states. New directions of Iran’s diplomacy are highlighted. The article concludes that amid global transition to a multipolar system of international relations, Tehran positions itself as a future decision-making center. Its strategic role in ensuring the security of the region, the development of transport infrastructure and involvement in international organizations indicate the growing influence of the country in Eurasia. The research also gives assessments about the possible directions of Iran’s foreign policy in Central Asia.

The relevance of the research topic is manifested in the fact that the strengthening of the Russian identity of the residents of Donbass is taking place in the context of an information war with Ukrainian nationalism. It is important to understand how Ukrainian political analytics constructs the image of the enemy. The aim of the work is to identify and criticize the myths about the identity of Donbass, constructed in Ukrainian political analytics (2014–2022). The theoretical basis of the study is a systematic approach, an identitarian approach, and social constructivism. Empirical methods: text analysis and discourse analysis. The selection of sources of Ukrainian political analytics includes texts published by the staff of the Institute of Political and Ethnonational Studies named after I.F. Kuras and the National Institute for Strategic Studies (Kiev) for 2014–2022. Тhe main aspects of constructing the image of the enemy and using the “language of hostility” are established: Russophobia, rejection of the Orthodox and East Slavic self-identification common to Russians and Ukrainians, falsification of historical facts, association of Donbass and its history exclusively with crime, marginality, separatism. These discursive techniques use by Ukrainian analysts in scientific texts in the external form of presentation, but they are aimed at defamation of the enemy and his ideological disarmament, therefore, they are one of the technologies of information warfare. In order to increase the effectiveness of the Russian identity policy in Donbass, it is necessary to form a picture of the world of the inhabitants of the region based on a positive perception of the history of Russia and the traditional values of Russian civilization, qualified and timely exposure of the myths of Ukrainian nationalist propaganda. The authors propose to organize an expert and analytical organization in the South of Russia on the subject of Ukrainian historical and socio-political studies.

In the context of the crisis of the liberal democratic model, authoritarian tendencies strengthen in all Central Asian countries, including Kyrgyzstan. This country demonstrated success in the process of democratic transit for a long time. The purpose of the article is to analyze the content and nature of political processes in Central Asian countries at the present stage. Based on the method of comparative analysis common and distinctive features in the political regimes of the countries of the region are highlighted. The Central Asian countries are grouped according to the principle of recurring trends in domestic political processes. In Central Asian countries, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan are the most vulnerable to «color revolutions». The likelihood of such a scenario, fraught with political instability, encourages some political leaders of the countries of the region (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan) to carry out reforms and design a political regime that more or less proportionally reflects economic reality and social needs, while others (Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan) resort to methods of «tightening the screws», clearing the space from political opposition. In both cases, this leads to the strengthening of the regime of personal power of the heads of state of the Central Asian countries, and, consequently, the president will continue to remain at the top of the power hierarchy. However, the results of the recent presidential elections in Uzbekistan and the presidential and parliamentary elections in Kazakhstan show that there is a demand for a strong government capable of ensuring socio-political order and stability in these societies.

Kazakhstan’s foreign policy began to take shape after the disintegration of the USSR. Changed geopolitical conditions set new tasks for the state. It became necessary to elaborate new approaches to external affairs. The peculiarity of Astana’s diplomacy was the expansion of relations with non-regional states while maintaining economic and political ties with the former Soviet republics. The article concludes that the foreign course of Kazakhstan was established under the influence of country’s economic development, its internal political processes and external factors. These aspects were reflected in the fundamental documents that were adopted in Kazakhstan in the following decades. The research highlights the main stages of Astana’s foreign policy and identifies the factors that determined the development of the state. In addition, it is concluded that the diplomacy of Kazakhstan was characterized by a balanced approach, which took into consideration the economic and political opportunities of the country. In recent decades, Astana’s foreign policy has been under the increased influence of non-regional actors, which show growing attention to Central Asia and the states of the area.

Applying the methodological means of neoclassical realism theory, the article analyzes the foreign policy of Romania in 1989–1992. In the first part, the author estimates the main theoretical principles of the theory. When comparing neorealism with neoclassical realism, the main principles of the latter are emphasized. In the second and third parts, the author undertakes an effort to apply a three-tier model – international, state, individual – in order to determine the possible reasons and motives behind a state’s actions, particularly those of Romania, in the international arena. On the example of this country, the author, thus, compares external factors (threats and challenges as a whole) and the state’s responses to them. The leader’s motives (understanding and interpretation of challenges) in the decision-making process are also taken into consideration. The author comes to the conclusion that, when analyzing a country’s foreign policy, the theory can be applied since it allows to explain empirical events.