Over the past year, Belarus -- one of Russia's steadfast military allies -- began slowly warming up to the West. But the political changes going on in the United States and Europe could give the nation, and other former Soviet states, cause to reconsider.
(MAXIM MALINOVSKY/AFP/Getty Images)
After three years of foundering and feuding with the West, things may be looking up for Russia. The Brexit vote in June exposed the deep discord in the European Union, giving Moscow a glimmer of hope that dissenting member states might break the bloc's consensus on its sanctions against Russia. a future vote on the sanctions against Russia. Though EU members again decided unanimously in July to extend the measures, upcoming elections on the Continent could further undermine the bloc's unity. In the United States, meanwhile, Donald Trump's victory in the Nov. 8 presidential vote has opened a potential path to warmer relations between the United States and Russia, and perhaps even an end to Washington's sanctions on Moscow. The turning political tides in Brussels and Washington could give the Kremlin the leeway to increase its influence in the former Soviet Union, leading the countries in Russia's periphery to re-evaluate...
