News Digest
FEDERATION COUNCIL URGES CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION OF GEORGIAN PRESIDENT
By empty (9/4/2002 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Federation Council member Aleksandr Nazarov on 4 September submitted an official request in the name of the upper chamber to the Prosecutor-General's Office asking for an investigation into whether Eduard Shevardnadze exceeded his authority while serving as Soviet foreign minister in 1990. The request stems from the 1990 agreement that delimits the border between Russia and the United States in the Bering Sea, which transferred rich fishing grounds to the United States. If an investigation determines that Shevardnadze, who is now president of Georgia, did exceed his authority in signing the pact, Nazarov will ask for a criminal case to be filed against him.PUTIN PRESSURES GEORGIAN PRESIDENT
By empty (9/5/2002 issue of the CACI Analyst)
President Vladimir Putin sent Eduard Shevardnadze a response to the Georgian president's recent message on the heightened tensions between the two countries. In his message, Putin wrote that he is "seriously concerned by the further activity" of Chechen fighters on Georgian territory. Putin said Russia does not accept Georgia's "tactic of peacefully squeezing out the terrorists from the Pankisi Gorge" and "insists on decisive, concrete, and purposeful actions for the destruction of bandit formations.KYRGYZ PARLIAMENT DEPUTY ACCUSED OF ABETTING IMU
By empty (9/6/2002 issue of the CACI Analyst)
National Security Service Chairman Kalyk Imankulov told a session of the Legislative Assembly (the lower parliament chamber) on 5 September there is evidence suggesting that parliament deputy Tursunbal Bakir Uulu maintained contacts with the banned Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, RFE/RL's Bishkek bureau reported. Imankulov claimed that calls have been made from a mobile phone registered in Bakir Uulu's name to "extremists" in Afghanistan. In 1999, Bakir Uulu helped to negotiate the release of hostages seized by the IMU in southern Kyrgyzstan.GEORGIAN OFFICIALS DISMISS CBS REPORT OF AL-QAEDA PRESENCE
By empty (9/6/2002 issue of the CACI Analyst)
In separate statements on 5 September, Georgian presidential spokesman Kakha Imnadze and National Security Ministry spokesman Nika Laliashvili both cast doubts on the accuracy of a "Pravda" report that cited cbsnews.com as reporting the previous evening that 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.