Field Reports
THE SOCCER BOOM IN AZERBAIJAN
By Gulnara Ismailova (11/3/2004 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Azerbaijan’s sometimes rocky relations with FIFA have now improved, and FIFA Joseph Blatter in Baku recently urged Azerbaijan to seek to host the World up for 17-year olds in Azerbaijan. Soccer is the most popular sport in Azerbaijan. It has hundred-year history in the country, although interest dramatically declined with the crisis at the end of the 1980s.GEORGIA’S ENDEMIC UNEMPLOYMENT PROBLEM
By Kakha Jibladze (11/3/2004 issue of the CACI Analyst)
In Tbilisi the situation is not better. On any given day, dozens of men stand around the Iliava Bridge in the city waiting for work. Their tools lie on the ground beside them as cars slowly pass by, looking for construction workers or day laborers.AFGHANISTAN’S PROFITABLE PAST
By Daan van der Schriek (11/3/2004 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Some 15 miles west of Mazar-e-Sharif lies the sleepy village of Balkh, amidst the impressive ruins of the ancient city of the same name – an old trading place between East and West that saw various illustrious visitors, such as Zoroaster, Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan. Today the site is receiving visitors as unwelcome as the Mongol conqueror who destroyed the town in 1220: illegal diggers who smuggle the site’s many and invaluable artifacts out of Afghanistan.Illegal excavation and export of archeological treasures does not just happen in Balkh – It takes place everywhere in Afghanistan.
“AMERICAN THREAT” LOOMS OVER KAZAKH-IRANIAN TALKS
By Marat Yermukanov (10/20/2004 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Iran is not a closed book for leaders of Kazakhstan. Economic and political links date long back, and this tradition of good relations is preserved to this day. In his first talks with the Iranian Foreign Minister Velayati in October 1996, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev characterized bilateral relations as “friendly’.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.