Eurasia News Week in Review - January 24, 2014 Share This /

Border violence continued to plague Central Eurasia this week, as tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan increased ahead of the foreign ministers’ meeting in Paris today, and Russia expanded its security zone into Georgian breakaway territory ahead of the Sochi Olympics. Below is a roundup of these stories and some of the other top articles and news highlights from around Central Eurasia over the last week:

Top Stories from Central Asia and the South Caucasus:

• Armenia and Azerbaijan reported countless ceasefire violations this week, after an incident between border troops early Monday morning led to a number of further clashes, causing deaths on both the Azerbaijani and Armenian side. Armenia claimed that Azerbaijan violated the ceasefire by sending two “subversive groups” totaling 30 servicemen across the border at night, while Azerbaijan at first denied that any incident had occurred at all. The State Department did not to comment on a specific incident, but it called on both sides “to try to refrain from violence and to work through issues through peaceful means.” On Wednesday, foreign ministers from both countries flew to Paris to attend a previously scheduled meeting between the two. The French, Russian, and United States co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group are to facilitate the talks.
• The United States will allocate $62 million to implement the plan of association with the European Union, Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) reported following a meeting with Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili on Sunday. Senator Inhofe, who visited Georgia as part of a larger Congressional delegation, also expressed the delegation’s strong support for Georgia’s NATO aspiration. Meanwhile, the Georgian Ministry of Defense announced that the NATO Military Committee will visit Georgia February 11, in order to discuss “military-political and NATO-Georgia cooperation in the context of regional security.”
• Human Rights Watch (HRW) released its World Report 2014, in which the human rights situation in the Central Asian states is widely criticized. Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at HRW, stated, “Security concerns linked to Afghanistan are important, but continuing rights abuses in Central Asian states also present a threat of long-term instability in their own right.” HRW continued, “While key concerns, regional security and military cooperation [between the United States/European Union and the Central Asian states] should not be used to downplay human rights problems.”
• Kazakhstan’s Foreign Minister, Erlan Idrissov, stated that Kazakhstan is concerned by the threat of instability from Afghanistan following the exit of U.S. and NATO forces. Central Asian leaders have frequently warned of potential instability spilling over from Afghanistan following NATO’s withdrawal, partly to secure additional assistance from outside powers to help them combat the perceived threat. Kazakhstan, however, had largely avoided the bleak warnings in the past, with the Kazakh President stating in April, “I will say it directly: I do not accept the catastrophic theories that we read and hear from various sides.”

Quick Hits from Central Asia and the South Caucasus:

• Joshua Kucera published his 2013 Central Eurasia Year in Review on the Security Assistance Monitor blog, with stories ranging from the U.S.’s forced exit from the Manas air base to Turkey’s selection of a Chinese missile defense system over U.S. and European bids.   
• Armenia’s Defense Minister said on Friday that the country is planning to send a peacekeeping contingency to Lebanon and is currently negotiating its size. The minister called Armenia’s peacekeeping proficiency, which the United States has sought to develop, one of the country’s most important areas of “international strategic cooperation.”
• Azerbaijan will be testing new Turkish combat ATAK (T-129) helicopters in the near future with the intent of purchasing up to 60 from the Turkish company TAI, according to reports on Thursday. The T-129 model corresponds to the American Cobra and Russian MI-24. 
• Russia expanded its security zone eleven kilometers into Georgian breakaway region, Abkhazia, on Monday, ahead of the upcoming Sochi Olympics. The Georgian Foreign Ministry responded by claiming the expansion is in violation of Georgia’s territorial integrity and motivated by political rather than “technical” reasons.
• Kyrgyzstan’s border service claimed that a special forces unit killed nine Uighur separatists trying to smuggle into Kyrgyzstan from China on Thursday. The Chinese-led security body in Eurasia, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), considers the Uighur population in China’s western Xinjiagn province to be one the region’s most serious threats. 
• The Secretary General of the Russian led security alliance, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), claimed that the United States is blocking closer cooperation between the CSTO and the western led alliance, NATO. 
• The CSTO outlined its priorities for 2014, which, according to Joshua Kucera, are very similar to previously identified goals, such as aid to Tajikistan’s border with Afghanistan, establishment of a joint air force, etc.
• Kazakhstan and Israel signed a security agreement on Monday, whose two focus areas include conducting joint Israeli-Kazakh exercises and trainings and strengthening cooperation between the military industries of both countries. 
• U.S. Charge d’Affaires John Ordway met with Kazakh presidential aide, Kairat Kozhamzharov, on Tuesday to discuss regional security issues, including the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and negotiations on the Iranian nuclear program.