Staunton, April 6 — Tajikistan is being pressured to shut down the Islamic Rebirth Party, something that will drive its members into the underground and make the Islamist threat there greater; and Dagestani leaders want to adopt an earlier Tajik policy and call home those from that republic now studying in Muslim schools abroad, something […]
Staunton, September 14 – Central Asians never have been happy that many in the outside world lump them altogether as “the stans” or under an even more disparaging rubric. Earlier this year, Kazakhstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev talked about renaming his country “Kazakh Eli,” and now some politicians in Kyrgyzstan are doing the same. (For a […]
Staunton, August 23 – Both Russian and Asian analysts say that Moscow’s focus on Ukraine is allowing Beijing to accelerate the process of transforming both Russia east of the Urals and Central Asia into its “near abroad,” thus undercutting in the east the very policy goals Vladimir Putin has proclaimed in the west. In Nezavisimaya […]
