Meeting up with Ambassador Peter Burian, Special Representative of the European Union for Central Asian Affairs

China and Central Asia: Growing Friendship at Russian Borders

Chinese Presence and Eurasian Integration Nirmala Joshi, Kamala Kumari: China’s Silk Road Economic Belt and the Central Asian Response Economic and political growth of China in the last two decades has become the key factor in global policy, and though the Chinese economy has somewhat cooled down lately, Beijing’s economy still continues to rise. In this context ...

European Union Interference in Central Asia: What Does It Mean for Russia and China?

The European Union (EU) has been active is Central Asia since the breakup of the Soviet Union twenty-five years ago. Despite its geographical remoteness, the EU has shown growing interest in the region and has launched several bilateral and multilateral initiatives designed to bring Central Asia ...

The Post-Soviet Space in 2017

... intervene in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Its participation will boil down to making declarations on the necessity to hold political negotiations and adhere to the ceasefire conditions. The CSTO will continue to conduct regular military exercises in Central Asia and will also develop its crisis response mechanisms. In October 2017, the CSTO adopted the Collective Security Strategy 2025, which includes an expanded list of challenges to be addressed. Now the organization is able to respond to a wide ...

Roundtable “The former Soviet Union 25 Years after: Past, Present and the Future of Ex-republics”

... geographical position of most former Soviet countries made their collaboration inevitable. Andrey Kazantsev, the Director of the Analytical Centre of Institute of International Studies, MGIMO University and RIAC expert, spoke about the situation in Central Asia. He stated that decline in economic migrants’ remittances affected Tajikistan’s and Uzbekistan’s economies. At the same time, Kyrgystan, the member of the EAEU, didn’t experience such negative impact. The expert also ...

Post-Soviet Turkmenistan: A Little-Known Present and an Uncertain Future

... socioeconomic change, as well as changes in its domestic and foreign policies. One of the most pressing problems today is the threat of religious extremism spreading through Turkmenistan, which could seriously affect security both within the country and in the Central Asian region as a whole. A Nation of Tribes In Soviet times, Turkmenistan was ranked alongside Tajikistan as the most backward republic in the USSR on all key socioeconomic indicators. Turkmenistan has large natural oil and gas reserves, and export ...

Experts from Russia, Germany, Sweden and China Discuss Safety of Large-Scale Development Projects in Eurasia

On October 20, 2016 the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the National Research University Higher School of Economics, the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy and the German Friedrich Ebert Foundation (Friedrich Ebert Stiftung) held an international seminar “The Silk Road Economic Belt: In Search of EU’s and China’s Common Interests in the Field of Security.” This workshop is the fourth in a series of international events, aimed at analyzing various...

Prospects for Russian-Chinese Cooperation in Central Asia

Working Paper #28 / 2016 The Working Paper is prepared by the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC) as part of the “Russia’s Interests in Central Asia” project. The goal of the publication is to outline the possibilities of cooperation between Russia and China in Central Asia by analyzing the interests of the two countries in relation to the interests of the Central Asian states themselves....

How Tajikistan's anti-radicalization policies aggravate the risk of radicalization

... on politically-motivated charges. Now, he has been released and made the face of Uzbekistan's anti-ISIS campaign, a move that has been met with success, according to Noah Tucker in his report on public and state responses to ISIS messaging in Central Asia. Uzbekistan’s shift in strategy to measured promotion of Islamic expression and practice has been effective in countering extremist arguments, which can be seen in online social media, says Tucker. He notes instances of Uzbeks posting ...

State Department speech reflects growing security risks in Central Asia

A recent address by senior State Department official Daniel Rosenblum signaled a shift in the direction of American policy in Central Asia, reflecting some critical economic, political and security developments in the area. The June 9th speech comes after an unprecedented five-country tour of Central Asia-- Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan-- by ...