Bloomberg: Why Does Putin Care Who Runs a Tiny Balkan Nation?

Russian leaders, whose conflict with Ukraine has seen them tussling with eastern Europe’s largest country, are now turning their gaze to a Balkan nation with fewer residents than Brooklyn.

There’s a common theme, though: gas pipelines.

Macedonia, a statelet of 2 million people carved from the ruins of Yugoslavia, is struggling with rampant corruption and lingering ethnic tensions.

Premier Nikola Gruevski’s embattled government, embroiled in a wiretapping scandal, supports plans for a Russian gas pipeline to Europe that would provide much needed revenue, and help the Kremlin sideline an existing supply route through its troublesome Ukrainian neighbor.

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