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Two regional stories from July 2018
Summary
A look back at a film festival prize in Odesa and Russian–Tajik military drills near the Afghan border in the days before 23 July 2018.
What did the region's news look like on 23 July 2018? Two reports from the preceding days point in very different directions: one cultural, one military.
On 21 July 2018, the Grand Prix of the Odesa International Film Festival went to Crystal («Кришталь»), directed by Daria Zhuk. The award was the festival's top prize.
Four days earlier, on 17 July 2018, Russia and Tajikistan began joint military exercises near the Afghan–Tajik border. As reported at the time, the drills were meant to deter potential Taliban attacks.
Reading the two together
The reports are unrelated, and nothing in them links the film prize to the exercises. Taken side by side, they show how varied the news from Ukraine and its wider neighbourhood was in the same week: a festival result in Odesa, and a security effort on the Afghan–Tajik frontier involving Russia.
