By Tavus Rejepova (2/2/2011 issue of the CACI Analyst)
On December 21, 2010, Turkmenistan’s authorities suspended the license of the local branch of Russia’s major mobile service company Mobile TeleSystems (MTS). The sudden refusal of the authorities to renew or prolong the company’s license led to a major dispute between the Ministry of Communications of Turkmenistan and MTS. The suspension of the service also generated nationwide frustration and live queues of thousands of people across the country trying to quickly switch from MTS to the state owned Altyn Asyr (Golden Age) mobile service provider.
By Roman Muzalevsky (2/2/2011 issue of the CACI Analyst)
For almost a decade, India has been actively yet unsuccessfully seeking to establish a military foothold in Tajikistan, where it helped renovate the Ayni air base. The facility has long been on the radar screens of many powers, including the U.S.
By Robert M. Cutler (1/19/2011 issue of the CACI Analyst)
After over fifteen years on the drawing-boards, the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline project was approved by the four countries’ leaders, meeting in Ashgabat in December. While the intergovernmental agreement naturally depends upon follow-on negotiations to be realized, it is anticipated that sales and purchase agreements will be signed at another four-way meeting that could take place as early as April 2011. The success of such a project would continue diversification of Turkmenistan’s gas export directions, provide needed resources to gas-hungry Pakistan and India, and not least give Afghanistan a keystone development project upon which to build economic reconstruction.
By Kevin Daniel Leahy (1/19/2011 issue of the CACI Analyst)
The leaders of the various ethno-republics in the Northern Caucasus rely on different personalities to represent their political interests at the federal level. Presidential aides Sergei Naryshkin and Vladislav Surkov represent the leaders of Ingushetia and Chechnya respectively. Meanwhile, the embattled leader of Dagestan, Magomedsalam Magomedov, is represented by Suleiman Kerimov, a billionaire oligarch who represents Dagestan in Russia’s upper house of parliament.
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.
Sign up for upcoming events, latest news and articles from the CACI Analyst