Analytical Articles

On January 19, President Dmitri Medvedev finally made good on his pledge to invest one particular official with ‘personal responsibility’ for overseeing the situation in the Northern Caucasus. Alexander Khloponin is the president’s plenipotentiary representative to the ‘North Caucasus Federal District’, a new jurisdictional entity created by Medvedev, and has also been awarded the rank of a deputy prime minister in the federal government. Given that Medvedev has identified an underperforming economy as the main reason for the instability in the region, how does the new envoy propose to stimulate the economic situation there? 

The opening of the first segment of the Turkmenistan-China gas pipeline last month is only one in a series of recent events in Caspian Sea basin energy developments. It signifies Turkmenistan’s first real moves to break its dependence upon Gazprom and the Russian state for international sales of its energy resources. These developments are to the detriment of Europe, which remains dependent upon Russia and Turkey as transit countries and has been unable to push forward the implementation of its Nabucco pipeline project.

Established as a firm presence in the information space in Kazakstan, the new media is increasingly embracing Western-style entertainment and social networking and even Western media content. Though Kazakhstan still lags behind many countries in terms of the number of internet users per capita, the arrival of smart phones, twitting, and file and photo sharing over the mobile-phone networks has helped to change the media landscape, making new media content accessible even in small cities and towns. These changes have intensified the discourse within the country about the future of the media culture: will Kazakhstan’s media be able to compete with the forces of globalization?

January was marked with events that further complicated the normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations. The ruling of the Constitutional Court of Armenia was the central event. Although the ruling supported the Turkish-Armenian protocols on normalized relations, improving their chances of being ratified, it led to strong Turkish criticism. In the preamble of its ruling, the Court presented its interpretation of the two documents, once more stressing the viewing of the Armenian side on the limits of their applications. The Turkish side accused Yerevan of attempting to revise the documents.

The recent U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee Hearing on Central Asian Affairs affirmed the significance of Central Asia for U.S. regional and global security interests. Even more so, it pointed to efforts of the U.S. government to link its faltering Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy with what it hopes will be a more robust regional policy toward Central Asia and the region more broadly. However, these dynamics appear to be primarily driven by the U.S. need to finish its “business” in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border areas rather than by the potential of the U.S.-Central Asian cooperation in its own right.

The late-January London Conference on Afghanistan, co-hosted by Prime Minister Gordon Brown, President Hamid Karzai and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, has many tasks, but one of the most important is to secure more durable military and economic commitments from the 43-nation coalition supporting the Afghan government. Most NATO governments frame their commitments in one- or two-year intervals, but President Karzai has argued that the Afghan government needs at least five years of sustained Western assistance to develop an Afghan military and police force capable of countering the Taliban insurgents without NATO combat support.

The functioning of the Inter-parliamentary Assembly of the CIS (IA CIS) in post-Soviet countries will in 2010 be celebrating its 18th anniversary. Although this organization is often left out of the analysis on the transformation of regimes or state institutions in the CIS, it serves as a key channel through which the values of adaptive parliamentarism and techniques of political control are being spread.

The underpinning ideas of the North Caucasian resistance have undergone several stages of transformation, from a purely nationalistic Chechen movement to an internationalized Islamic jihad. The movement now seems to be going through yet another evolutionary phase, this time for more pragmatic purposes. Due to the enforced Russian surveillance of religious Muslims, the jihadists are now seeking to downplay and adapt their appearance and behavior for the purpose of becoming better equipped to conduct terrorist operations.

Turkey’s normalization of relations with Armenia should normally be an occasion for rejoicing. However, due to inept Turkish and U.S. diplomacy, this reconciliation is not only incomplete; it could also easily fall apart, leading to a reversal of hopes for stabilization of the security situation in the Caucasus. A breakdown of this process could be devastating for the region. Ankara’s and Washington’s mistakes have already reversed Baku’s ties with both governments and could cause further reorientation of its foreign policy from which only Moscow would benefit. As Azerbaijan is critical for both access to Central Asia and overflights to Afghanistan and is the linchpin for any possibility of the Nabucco pipeline’s materialization, a reorientation towards Russia would have serious repercussions for Europe and the U.S..

The recent official visit of Indian President Pratihba Patil to Tajikistan may be emblematic of a new focus in Indian foreign policy. India’s establishment of military bases, upgrading of diplomatic relations and increase of financial activity in Tajikistan might be interpreted as a new ‘forward’ strategy. Geography reveals the rationale – Tajikistan borders Afghanistan and is separated from Pakistani administered Kashmir by a strip of Afghan territory. Moreover, the former Soviet republic shares borders with China, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. This raises a pertinent question - is India is developing a regional strategy derived from Lord Curzon and the British ‘forward’ school?