News Digest
KAZAKH, KYRGYZ, UZBEK LEADERS CONGRATULATE YANUKOVYCH
By empty (11/25/2004 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbaev, Kyrgyz President Askar Akaev, and Uzbek President Islam Karimov have all congratulated Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych on his victory in the bitterly disputed 21 November presidential runoff, agencies reported. President Nazarbaev expressed his \"heartfelt congratulations,\" adding, \"Your victory testifies to the Ukrainian people\'s choice in favor of a united nation, a democratic path of development, and economic progress.\" The runoff results have sparked mass protests in Ukraine and widespread international skepticism; the only other world leaders to have congratulated Yanukovych are Russian President Vladimir Putin and Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka.JAILED AZERBAIJANI OPPOSITIONISTS APPEAL FOR CLEMENCY
By empty (11/24/2004 issue of the CACI Analyst)
The seven Azerbaijani opposition leaders who were sentenced to up to five years\' imprisonment on charges of inciting violent protests in Baku after the October 2003 presidential election have asked Azerbaijan\'s top Muslim clergyman, Sheikh-ul-Islam Allakhshukur Pashazade, to present President Ilham Aliyev with their collective appeal for a pardon. Pashazade is a member of the presidential commission on pardons. Even before the seven men were sentenced, President Aliyev hinted that there was no doubt as to their guilt; he subsequently said they would not be pardoned in the near future.ARDZINBA SAYS HE WILL REMAIN PRESIDENT PROVISIONALLY
By empty (11/24/2004 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Vladislav Ardzinba, the incumbent president of Abkhazia, will remain in office until the next president is elected in a repeat poll, and will ignore next month\'s inauguration of the announced winner of the disputed October 3 election, the presidential office said on Wednesday. The planned inauguration ceremony on December 6 is unconstitutional and will have no legal foundation, Ardzinba\'s spokesman Roin Agrba said in a statement. Abkhazia has been the scene of major public unrest since the October 3 presidential election, whose results sparked bitter disputes among supporters of the two main candidates.PUTIN REACTS TO POLITICAL CRISIS IN UKRAINE
By empty (11/24/2004 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Russian President Vladimir Putin said in Lisbon on 23 November that Russia can neither recognize nor protest the the presidential runoff in Kyiv because \"no official results have been announced,\" Russian and Western news agencies reported. He added that \"I can advise others to follow our example,\" in an apparent jab at the U.S.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.