Kazakhstan is taking final steps in preparation for the upcoming early parliamentary elections, scheduled for March 20. According to the Central Election Commission, as of March 4, the government has accommodated applications from 308 international observers and 116 media representatives. This year’s elections are widely... MORE

Many observers both inside and outside Central Asia have noticed China’s rising economic influence there, supplanting the region’s traditional hegemon, Russia. In yet another sign of China’s growing economic clout in Eurasia, Astana International Financial Center governor and former National Bank chairman Kairat Kelimbetov announced,... MORE

In a recent interview with the media, Kyrgyzstan’s Deputy Prime Minister Oleg Pankratov, whose portfolio includes overseeing the country’s membership in the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU), reported that the Kyrgyz Republic’s accession (as of August 12, 2015) to this Russian-led trading bloc has so far... MORE

Twenty-five years after gaining its political independence, Uzbekistan has become “railway independent,” with its residents now able to travel between one part of their Central Asian republic to another, by rail, without crossing into another country—in this case, Tajikistan. On April 15, a new 123.1-kilometer... MORE

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu visited Kazakhstan, on February 6, where he and his host government discussed bilateral cooperation on large-scale transit corridor projects (Akorda, February 6). As a “new Silk Road” of transportation infrastructure slowly emerges across Eurasia, Turkey and Kazakhstan are becoming important... MORE

It has been half a year since Kyrgyzstan officially joined the Moscow-led Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) of Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus and Armenia. Its accession treaty took effect on August 12, 2015. That same day, Kazakhstan tore down customs controls on its border with the Kyrgyz... MORE

Increasingly, it seems that wherever one looks in Central Asia, Russia is losing ground. This retreat is not confined to economics, though it is certainly present in this sphere. Notably, Moscow is also finding it increasingly difficult to compete militarily in Central Asia. For example,... MORE

Mongolia’s national energy program has made significant progress in the past year. According to Energy Minister Dashzeveg Zorigt, in 2015, legislation regulating the energy sector was revised, electric power imports (one-fifth of energy comes from neighboring China and Russia) were significantly cut by $9 million,... MORE

Because Vladimir Putin has made the presence of ethnic Russians in other countries so central to his efforts to expand Moscow’s influence, their departure from any region or country means far more now than it did a decade ago. Nowhere has their exit been more... MORE

Since an uprising unseated the pro-Russian regime of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014, relations between Kyiv and Moscow have gone from bad to worse. Responding to a recent ban of Ukrainian imports and seeking a way to reach post-Soviet Central Asian states and... MORE