This paper briefly outlines the conventional threats to the security of the five former Soviet states of Central Asia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. It also attempts to identify the common features contributing to insecurity in the region. The new and quite disturbing threat to regional insecurity – the growing risk of a spillover of insurgency into the region from Afghanistan is also discussed.

1. Human rights.
2. Energy security
3. Regime stability
4. Outlook

 When Joschka Fischer's lucrative new job as the "political communications advisor" to a consortium of European energy companies was leaked to a German business publication this summer, there was one comment that stood out. "Welcome to the club," said Gerhard Schröder, an even more highly paid advocate for the other side in Europe's increasingly politicized energy war.

This paper analyses the potential effects that the systemic developments stemming from the global financial crisis and the August war are likely to have in Georgia, within a context of hegemonic stability theoretical fundamentals. According to this perspective, both events have undermined the role of the US as the sole world hegemon. As a result, the Western strategic priorities toward the Caucasus are likely to shift, to the detriment of the special relationship between the Saakashvili administration and the US. To demonstrate this, the analysis will focus on the case study provided by energy- and transit-related Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), as the Georgian political and economic dependence on a geopolitical rent is strongly connected to them and is likely to disappear in the aftermath of the recent events.

The subject of Caspian and Middle East gas pipelines to Europe has become increasingly important and emotive in the late 2000s with many projects and aspirations being advanced to create a “4th corridor” aimed at significant reducing dependence on (primarily) Russian gas. The role of Turkey will be critical for all of these projects. While the details of pipeline projects are well known, the role and aspirations of Turkey as an energy transit country have received less attention. Some have portrayed Turkey as a country critical to European energy security and a potential hub for Caspian and Middle East (oil and) gas supplies. But some Turkish statements and commercial positions in relation to pipeline projects have raised questions about the conditions which the country may intend to attach to this role, some of which could be seen as obstacles to natural gas transit. Because of the partisan nature of much of the current debate, it was important to find an author capable of making an expert, but unbiased, assessment of the Turkish position.

Gareth Winrow has long experience in Turkey and was the ideal choice to interview Turkish stakeholders in relation to the many different aspects of the country’s energy situation and the fourth corridor. I am very grateful to Gareth for taking on this project and believe that his paper adds significantly to understanding the complexity of the problems related to these issues.

In the spring of 2009 Russia remains in the midst of deep recession, as the country seeks to pull itself out of the biggest economic crisis faced since 1998. The political challenge this poses to the current Russian government of Prime Minister and former-President, Vladimir Putin, is substantial...

Russia has been badly affected by the economic crisis, because in the boom years - when it was able to rely on oil and gas exports - it had not diversified its economic base or introduced any major structural economic reforms, speakers agreed at an EPC Policy Dialogue organised with the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and with World Bank support. They hoped the crisis would spur Moscow to introduce reforms, particularly to modernise the banking sector, public administration and governance structures.

Sergey Markedonov, a prescient analyst of the Caucasus, assesses in this Xenophon Paper the possible implications of the August 2008 “five day war”. He initiates a discussion on the region’s “unfreezing of the conflicts” and provides an in-depth description of the existent non-recognised state entities and the other ethno-political conflicts with which the Caucasus is ridden. The author also explores the perspectives of major regional and extra-regional stakeholders in the area and the ambitious policies they deploy at the moment: the Russian stabilisation project, the American “Greater Middle East” project and the European Union social and economic (soft security) project...

Since the January 2009 gas crisis, top-level Russian officials have been suggesting that the Energy Charter Treaty should be reviewed. The Treaty was signed in 1994, but never ratified, by Russia. Russian gas giant Gazprom repeatedly invoked the Treaty’s incompatibility with its own interests and often claimed that it should be amended. One of the main dilemmas for Gazprom has always been the question of transit: how to ensure a reliable gas transit through Belarus and Ukraine on the one hand, while preserving a monopoly on the gas transit from Central Asia on the other?...