By Emil Souleimanov (06/04/2014 issue of the CACI Analyst)
News has recently spread of the involvement of Chechens in the Ukraine crisis. According to numerous eyewitnesses, members of Chechen elite units, commonly known as kadyrovtsy, were spotted in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk where they were reportedly deployed in combat against local Ukrainian troops. Soon, sources in Chechnya started informing of dozens of corpses of Chechens being transported from Ukraine back to this North Caucasian republic. The participation of the kadyrovtsy units in military operations outside the North Caucasus indicates a novel trend that could have broad security implications transcending the region’s borders.
By Richard Weitz (06/04/2014 issue of the CACI Analyst)
The recent signing of the Eurasian Union Treaty between Russia and several other former Soviet republics, combined with Russian actions in Ukraine and the massive Sino-Russian gas deal finalized during Russian President Vladimir Putin’s recent visit to China, risks obscuring the continuing growth of Beijing’s influence in Central Asia, especially with Kazakhstan. When President Nursultan Nazarbayev conducted a state visit to China from May 19 to 22, he met with President Xi Jinping for the seventh time in less than a year. Although grassroots ties remain weak, energy and other economic ties between the two countries are booming.
By Jacob Zenn (06/04/2014 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Recent terrorist attacks in China show that international jihadists have infiltrated or influenced the Uighur nationalist cause. The increasing frequency of car-bombings and suicide bombings in Xinjiang and cities in eastern China attest to the use of al-Qaeda’s tactics, which militants in China may have learned from training with Central Asian jihadists in Pakistan, Afghanistan or Syria or seeing videos that militant groups disseminate on the Internet or through underground Islamist networks in China. In May 2014, China launched a one-year campaign to crack down on terrorism intended to uncover terrorist networks and extremist groups. However, the crackdown may also alienate Xinjiang’s Uighur population and boost recruitment into militant groups if the new counter-terrorism measures are perceived as over-reaching or invasive.
Erica Marat and Deborah Sutton (06/04/2014 issue of the CACI Analyst)
The reform of Georgia’s police, starting from 2004 under former President Mikheil Saakashvili, represents an unprecedented success in the post-Soviet region. Corruption among rank-and-file police personnel was largely defeated, and the police in general became more professional in responding to citizens’ concerns. However, the reform proceeded without public oversight and participation of the parliament, leading to a politicization of the security sector. In the 2012 parliamentary elections, the Georgian Dream opposition coalition pledged to open the security sector for public input. After a brief period of openness to external oversight in 2013, the window of opportunity for public-police collaboration is again closing.
The Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst is a biweekly publication of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Program, a Joint Transatlantic Research and Policy Center affiliated with the American Foreign Policy Council, Washington DC., and the Institute for Security and Development Policy, Stockholm. For 15 years, the Analyst has brought cutting edge analysis of the region geared toward a practitioner audience.
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