IS ISLAM A THREAT TO STABILITY IN CENTRAL ASIA?
By Dr. Shahram Akbarzadeh (3/1/2000 issue of the CACI Analyst)
BACKGROUND: On 11 February 2000, the Kyrgyz Security Council Secretary Bolot Januzakov warned of an impending incursion by 700 strong Islamic fighters from northern Tajikistan into Kyrgyz territory. These Islamic fighters were said to be under the command of Juma Namangani and running a campaign against President Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan. Namangani's guerrillas were reportedly involved in the kidnapping of four Japanese citizens in southern Kyrgyzstan in October 1999.
REVOLUTIONARY BUT NOT A SECOND IRANIAN REVOLUTION
By Gary G. Sick (3/1/2000 issue of the CACI Analyst)
BACKGROUND: On February 18, 2000, Iran held elections for the Majles (parliament), the sixth since the 1979 revolution overthrew Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi and established an Islamic Republic. Since the late 1980s, when the Iran-Iraq war ended and Ayatollah Khomeini died, a reform movement has emerged in Iran, challenging the dominance of hard line conservatives and clerics and pressing for greater freedom of expression, government accountability, rule of law, and expanded personal liberty. This movement has gained enormous momentum since the landslide election of reformist President Mohammad Khatami in 1997.
CHINA\'S QUEST FOR EURASIA\'S NATURAL RESOURCES
By Ariel Cohen (2/26/2003 issue of the CACI Analyst)
BACKGROUND: The Chinese government has designated oil, grain and water as strategic commodities with maximum influence on economic development. While China is the world\'s fifth largest oil producer, demand is outgrowing economic production. By 2020, China will not be able to supply itself with oil, iron, steel, aluminum, sulfur, and other minerals.TAJIKISTAN’S ELECTIONS: EVEN A BAD PEACE IS BETTER THAN A JUST WAR
By Dr. Yokubjon Abdukholikov (3/15/2000 issue of the CACI Analyst)
BACKGROUND: The year 1997 was one of reconciliation for Tajikistan’s opposing political forces and began a period of social stability in the war-torn country. For the first time since the civil war, representatives of opposition parties decided to administer the government together. A referendum led to constitutional amendments that overturned the law banning United Tajik Opposition political parties and reformed the election system that constituted the legal basis of the recent presidential and parliamentary elections.
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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.