News Digest
BEIJING SEEN TRANSFORMING SHANGHAI SIX INTO CHINESE CIS
By empty (6/29/2001 issue of the CACI Analyst)
According to an article in "Kommersant-Vlast," No. 25, China is "using the Shanghai Forum to subvert the Central Asian states," to drive out Russian influence there, and to create "a kind of Chinese CIS." The supplement said that "the Shanghai Six already looks like an alliance of autocracies, where Russia is the only ill-fitting element.UZBEK PRESIDENT DECREES INCREASE IN PENSIONS, MINIMUM WAGE
By empty (7/2/2001 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Islam Karimov has issued a decree raising pensions and budget sector wages by an average of 40 percent beginning on 1 August. The minimum monthly wage will rise to 3,450 soms ($9.1) and pensions to 6,780 soms.RUSSIA REFUSES TO ALLOW GEORGIAN AIRLINES FLIGHT TO MOSCOW
By empty (6/28/2001 issue of the CACI Analyst)
A Georgian airlines flight from Tbilisi to Moscow was cancelled on 27 June after the Russian air administration refused to allow it to enter Russian airspace, Caucasus Press reported. Georgian Deputy Transport Minister Giorgi Karbelashvili said the same day that Russia has no right to cancel flights without prior warning, and that Tbilisi will complain to the International Civil Aviation Organization. The plane took off from Tbilisi for Moscow on 28 June.KYRGYZ MINISTERS DECLINE TO TESTIFY TO PARLIAMENT COMMISSION
By empty (6/28/2001 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Foreign Minister Muratbek Imanaliev, Defense Minister Esen Topev, and Justice Minister Jakyp Abdrakhmanov on 27 June ignored a request to testify before the parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs concerning the controversial border agreements signed with China in 1996 and 1999. Instead, the ministers sent lower-ranking officials who were unable to answer parliament deputies' questions. (RFE/RL).Visit also
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Joint Center Publications
Analysis Niklas Swanström and Leah Oppenheimer, "Invisible Ink: Looking for the Lost Trade between China, Russia, and Central Asia", ISDP Policy Brief, 13 March 2013. 
New Silk Road Paper S. Frederick Starr with Adib Farhadi, Finish the Job: Jump-Start the Afghan Economy, December 2012.
Conference Report Cheryl Benard, Eli Sugarman, and Holly Rehm, Cultural Heritage vs. Mining on the New Silk Road? Finding Technical Solutions for Mes Aynak and Beyond (in cooperation with the Alliance for the Restoration of Cultural Heritage) December 2012.
Article Svante E. Cornell, "The 'Afghanization of the North Caucasus: Causes and Implications of a Changing Conflict", in Stephen Blank, ed., Russia's Homegrown Insurgency: Jihad in the North Caucasus, Carlisle, PA: U.S. Army War College Strategic Studies Institute, 2012.