The Rundown -- September 18

# YahooNews uses RFE/RL Balkans video of flooding in Serbia

# The Blaze uses Li Luo's map of foreign fighter's in Syria

# Moscow calls eastern Ukraine special status laws "a step in the right direction"

# One million civil servants to be screened for corruption

# "Ghosts of the Maidan" - Michael Weiss, Foreign Policy

# "Time to Give Ukraine Defensive Weapons"- Steven Pifer and Strobe Talbott, CNN

# Russia and Egypt sign preliminary $3.5 billion arms deal

# How Bulgaria and Interpol are helping Vladimir Putin imprison European citizens

# Russia "extremism" cases double, largely Internet-related

# "Russia is Our Most Dangerous Neighbor" - Martin Wolf, "Financial Times"

# "Tycoon's Arrest Sends Shock Wave Through Russia" - Nataliya Vasilyeva, AP

# "Food fest" in Belarus following sanctions

# "Belarus And Poland: Brought Together By Russian Sanctions?" - Paula Borowska, Belarus Digest

# Kurds retake seven Christian villages

# Rand Paul spreads McCain/IS meeting hoax

# Obama plans to tightly control strikes in Syria (counterinsurgency in Iraq/counterterrorism in Syria?)

# Militants under growing pressure

Iran
# "Happy" dancers sentenced to six months and 91 lashes

# Iran detains UK citizen over ban on women watching sports alongside men

# Breakthrough in New York nuclear talks "unlikely"

# Zarif says any deal is better than nothing

Afghanistan/Pakistan
# "Washington Post" editorial: Afghanistan stability depends on Abdullah-Ghani deal

# Seventh journalist killed in Afghanistan this year