Iran's fate rests on US relations with an emerging Chinese-Russian axis
As the recent popular violence in Kyrgyzstan reminded us, Central Asia is strategically vital. The West needs to work with Russia, and China, to put in place a programme of pre-emptive damage control
Though political infighting continues to hinder reform, Ukraine’s new president is equally unlikely to drop the European rhetoric and defer to Moscow, writes Mykola Riabchuk. For the time being at least, Ukraine's leadership will continue to "muddle through"
Kyrgyzstan is suffering from a crisis of governance, reports Madeleine Reeves. But an analysis of the problems that limits itself to “state failure” is missing the point. What brought the Kyrgyz on to the streets was inequality and economic misery, muffled for years by the New Great Game.
The ineptitude of policies championed by the USA is to blame for the political violence in Kyrgyzstan which overthrew the government. Only a long-term vision of radical political change could make amends. David Coombes lays out key priorities
The plane crash at Smolensk which Poland’s president has provoked an outpouring of Russian sympathy, from Putin down. It has helped many Russians identify their country’s responsibility for the Katyn massacre in 1940. But it has left many others unmoved, even cynical. ‘Re-setting’ Russian-Polish r
Seventeen years after civil war, Abkhazia is finally recovering under Russian protection. But many inside the country are unhappy, fearing association with their big brother will result in another loss of independence.
The new Ukrainian government has turned out to be a rather ugly bunch: coarse, corrupt, opaque and inexperienced from the President down. Not much different from the previous lot, then.
Kyrgyzstan’s ex-president Bakiev had not delivered on his promise to Russia to close the American airbase at Manas, Arkady Dubnov reminds us. But the Kremlin did not depose him. In Central Asia, Russia looks to other ways of tipping the board...
Kyrgyzstan’s government has fallen, its provisional rulers are untested, and there is as yet no sign of a lasting political settlement. Yet that does not mean it will automatically follow the example of neighbour Tajikistan and descend into civil war, writes John Heathershaw
Kyrgyzstan’s violence underscores the instability of those former Soviet governments which are burdened by authoritarian and corrupt rule. To varying degrees, every Central Asian country faces serious threats at home and from the war in neighboring Afghanistan. They need help. The West and Russia
As another “colour revolution” is overthrown in Kyrgyzstan, Boris Dolgin reflects that it changed nothing. Will the country be able to sort out a more nuanced relationship with the USA, Russia and China?
