INTERNATIONAL PRESSURE FOR DEMOCRATIZATION IN THE SOUTH CAUCASUS HOLDS BOTH PROMISE AND THREATS
By Jaba Devdariani (7/30/2003 issue of the CACI Analyst)
BACKGROUND: During the last years, speculations were mounting in academic and policy communities that the United States and the EU were turning a blind eye on apparent lack of progress in democratic development of the three South Caucasus countries. It was seen as symptomatic that the South Caucasus started to be increasingly viewed in the context of the broader Central Asia region, rather than as a part of Eastern Europe. This trend was dominant in U.FROM RUSSIA TO CUBA: THE JOURNEY OF THE RUSSIAN TALIBAN
By Andrew McGregor (7/16/2003 issue of the CACI Analyst)
BACKGROUND: The reaction from the Tatar leaders of official Russian Islam to the American campaign in Afghanistan was mixed. Mufti Talgat Tadjuddin referred to the ‘aggressive, half-learned, maniacally ambitious rabble forming the core of the Taliban’. Siberian Mufti Nafigulla Ashirov condemned the American ‘crusade’ against Islam and warned of the threat posed to Russia by a permanent US military presence in Central Asia.POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS FRAGILE AS GEORGIA HEADS INTO ELECTIONS
By Blanka Hancilova (7/16/2003 issue of the CACI Analyst)
BACKGROUND: The latest opinion poll conducted by the International Republican Institute (IRI) in April suggests that if elections were held “tomorrow”, the pro-presidential “Alliance for New Georgia” led by Shevardnadze (officially formed as an election bloc in March 2003 by Shevardnadze’s Citizens’ Union of Georgia, the rather weak Socialist and National Democratic parties, along with some influential, but discredited governors and the Greens), would barely clear the 7% threshold necessary to gain seats in the parliament. While the opposition is still fragmented, on the whole it enjoys considerable popular support. In the June 2002 local elections, the Labor Party and the National Movement Party, two populist parties running under the slogan of “Tbilisi without Shevardnadze” emerged on top of the race in the capital Tbilisi, clearly showing the increasing power of the protest vote.LIGHT AT THE END OF THE BAKU-ASHGHABAD TUNNEL?
By Hooman Peimani (7/16/2003 issue of the CACI Analyst)
BACKGROUND: Turkmen-Azerbaijani peaceful and tension-free relations began to experience difficulties late in the first half of the 1990s when both countries started their exploration of the Caspian Sea for offshore oilfields. In the absence of a legal regime for the division of the world\'s largest lake, the two Caspian littoral states found themselves in conflicting situation regarding the ownership of certain oilfields to which both countries had claims. In particular, the ownership of Azeri, Chirag, and Guneshli, as well as the Serdar (according to the Turkmens) or Kyapaz (according to the Azerbaijanis), has been a source of tension between the two Caspian neighbours since the mid-1990s.Visit also
Staff Publications
Silk Road Paper S. Frederick Starr, Greater Central Asia as A Component of U.S. Global Strategy, October 2024.
Analysis Laura Linderman, "Rising Stakes in Tbilisi as Elections Approach," Civil Georgia, September 7, 2024.
Analysis Mamuka Tsereteli, "U.S. Black Sea Strategy: The Georgian Connection", CEPA, February 9, 2024.
Silk Road Paper Svante E. Cornell, ed., Türkiye's Return to Central Asia and the Caucasus, July 2024.
Book Svante E. Cornell, ed., "The Changing Geopolitics of Central Asia and the Caucasus" AFPC Press/Armin LEar, 2023.
Silk Road Paper Svante E. Cornell and S. Frederick Starr, Stepping up to the “Agency Challenge”: Central Asian Diplomacy in a Time of Troubles, July 2023.
Silk Road Paper S. Frederick Starr, U.S. Policy in Central Asia through Central Asian Eyes, May 2023.