In the margins of the SCO conference, a bilateral agreement between China and Kazakhstan has furthered Kazakhstan's trade relations and may potentially regularize Central Asia's energy market. Here's the trade portion of the Central Asia NewsNet article, (somewhat edited here). Note that higher energy prices increased the dollar volume: A. In 2006 [China-Kazakhstani] bilateral trade volume hit […]
News? What news? Kazakhstan had elections this Saturday after a short campaign season. President Nazarbaev's Nur-Otan party won over 80% of the legislative seats, and handily. The OSCE sent observers, who again found the elections to be ‘not free and not fair’. The observers noted that ballot-boxes were allegedly stuffed; that the short election season put Kazakhstan's minority […]
The party's over: The SCO Summit in Bishkek this past week wrapped up with barely a stir in the Western news, and after seeking in vain for a keynote sentence to sum it up, I learned there wasn't one. Joshua Kucera at his blog Istanbul – Beijing was able to cover the summit: his first […]
In previous Casual Fridays, we looked at yurts, a kind of nomadic architecture, and the great Islamic architecture in Khiva and other Central Asian heritage sites. I want to turn to some of the newest Central Asian architecture. I picked Astana because the capital of Kazakhstan moved here from Almaty in 1997-1998. Therefore it has been […]
Since almost all the news revolves and resolves around the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit, I’m going to try to hit most of the non-SCO news here in the Central Asia Beat this week. Next week, I’ll try to wrap up SCO developments. . . Kazakhstan: –From RFE/RL Newsline, August 16: The Kazakhstan Today news agency, formerly […]
“If anyone, no matter who, were given the opportunity of choosing from amongst all the nations in the world the set of beliefs which he thought best, he would inevitably, after careful consideration of their relative merits, choose that of his own country. Everyone without exception believes his own native customs, and the religion he […]
For the most part, one of those wait-and-see kind of weeks: Military News: –U.S. troop morale is down, as noted by high rates of suicides . –Now that Britain is pulling out of Iraq, they plan to focus more on Afghanistan. –Germany loses three soldiers; in roadside attack, and discuss their determination and their options. […]
According to files recently received by George Washington University's National Security Archive, the U.S. has been pushing Pakistan since the early and mid 1990's to close down its terrorist safe havens, and documents times and places where Pakistani troops trained and/or fought with Taliban or terrorist leaders. Of course this was before 9/11. Here is […]
Nick Fick wrote an article in the Washington Post on August 12th is making its way through the Afghanistan-watchers blog-land, and it joins with many who are looking at U.S. tactics of keeping ahead in Afghanistan, the actual-land. It begins with his experience of having a gun aimed at him indiscriminately at a checkpoint. The Article: […]
Itar-Tass reports that the presidents of Turkmenistan and Kyrgyzstan will be cementing cooperative efforts “on all levels.” A meeting took place between Kyrgyzstan's Mr. Bakiev and Turkmenistan's Mr. Berdymukhamedov as part of unofficial SCO activities. Mr. Berdymukhamedov is an honorary guest at the SCO summit this year. It is his first time attending the event. […]
This week, the Stockholm International Water Institute is celebrating the “World Water Week”. We’re all pretty focused on oil these days, but in reality, water scarcity is more of a challenge. Last year, the UN Development Programme issued a report that highlighted water scarcity and the political and institutional reasons that water remained a tight factor […]
Well, the war games are now in Chelyabinsk until the 17th. We have to wait a little while longer for the mass press releases that usually attend the political meetings of the Annual SCO Summit. But so far, things are looking quite interesting. President Hu of China arrived in Bishkek today, and it looks like he's […]
Well, I don't mind saying I thought this case was over and done, but it isn't. Mr. Seidenfeld, who has been held in jail while undergoing a trial with what looked like exceedingly shaky evidence, was acquitted last month. However, the original complainant, AOA Arna, has filed an appeal of the judge's sentence. According to an […]
Jakarta: Approximately two weeks ago, I mentioned the Hizb-ut-Tahrir World Conference 2007 that was to take place in Jakarta on August 12th. Well, BBC's Lucy Williamson covered the conference, which was well-attended: it filled the 100,000-capacity stadium that had been booked. Several speakers who had previously committed did not show, however. London: On August 9, […]
This video is from Worldvision, and documents the actual living conditions of homeless children in Mongolia. Film conveys a lot: but like almost all art, it does not convey touch, smell, taste; this video does its best to include at least a verbal document of those miseries of children's street life. Along the way, it […]