Jamestown Releases Transcript of its North Caucasus Event

All-Day Conference Examines a Critical Region

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE — September 27, 2006

Contact: Jonathan Hutzley, +1 202.483.1405

WASHINGTON, DC (9/27/06)–On September 14, more than 150 people attended a conference hosted by The Jamestown Foundation entitled "The Future of the North Caucasus," held at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, DC. The all-day conference featured 13 presentations by experts on the North Caucasus region and the various issues attendant to that region. These experts included: Dr. Moshe Gammer, a senior lecturer in Middle Eastern and African History at Tel Aviv University; Dr. Pavel Baev, a research professor at the Norwegian Peace Research Institute; Dr. Andrew McGregor, the director of Aberfoyle International Security Analysis in Toronto; Marie Bennigsen, a renowned specialist on the North Caucasus; and many others. A keynote address, entitled "The Future of the North Caucasus," was delivered by Paul Goble, Vice Dean for the Social Sciences and Humanities at Audentes University in Tallinn, Estonia.

A full transcript of the event, in addition to individual papers presented by the speakers, is available here.

The conference was an effort to shed much-needed light on this unsettled corner of Russia. The conference focused not just on Chechnya, but it also highlighted ongoing events in neighboring Dagestan, Ingushetia as well as the western Caucasian territories such as Adygeya and Kabardino-Balkaria. Speakers discussed the historical, political and economic roots of the separatist tensions that currently exist across the North Caucasus.

Founded in 1984, The Jamestown Foundation is an independent, non-partisan research institution dedicated to providing timely information concerning critical political and strategic developments in China, Russia, and Eurasia. Jamestown’s research and analysis is available to the public free-of-charge via Jamestown’s website, www.jamestown.org.