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agreed to convene such meetings in the future. The issues of the legal status of the Caspian Sea, the unity the Caspian "Five" in the form of the structure like OVES, the disarmament in the Caspian Sea, the perspectives of the region - all remain urgent issues.
The communication systems are of great significance for economic growth of the region's states, particularly in Azerbaijan. The number of such systems is growing every year, and new projects are being implemented. The communication lines, which are laid through the territory of Azerbaijan, successfully compete with the other analogous systems. The purposeful activities of diplomacy of Azerbaijan, on the one side, and the geopolitical reality, on the other side, contribute to the success of Azerbaijan.
"Voprosy natsionalnyh i federativnyh otnosheniy", M., 2010, p. 114-123.
R. Sharipov,
cand. of sciences (philosophy) THE PROBLEM OF ETHNO-POLITICAL PROCESSES IN THE POST-SOVIET CENTRAL ASIA
The events of the end of XX and the first decade of XXI centuries are the indicative example of that the ethnic realities having made the geo-politicians cardinally to change their views at the world picture are one of the most important instruments in the "collision of civilizations" developing before the eyes of the world community (S. Huntington). There were many attempts to take away the international policy from the ethnic sphere during XIX-XX centuries, to shut the eyes to the problems being constantly accumulated in the interethnic relations, to solve them for the account
of complex policy of checks and balances in the form of numerous alliances of "title" states-empires striving for the world dividing according to watersheds of their economic interest zones at any rate. However, as the experience of the First World War showed the there is a very serious danger in the ethnic conflicts which can suddenly destroy the harmonious geopolitical systems but their tasks were the interest serving of "successful" (first of all, the European) nations having progressed on the way of "civilization" and "progress" also for the account for a development as the colonial empires. The hard lesson was Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman and the Russian Empire's disintegration for the community of "progressive" states. The Second World War, the epoch of the postwar perturbations in the South-East Asia, colonial domination release of Africa and India, the drama of "Iron Curtain" and "cold war" are the realities of not too distant past. And, perhaps, the world community came to conclusion only by the end of XX century that a future development of the international relations will be a jump into the sea of the new shocks, wars and geopolitical cataclysms without considered scientifically substantiated ethnic policy.
The last drama of the past century was a swift disintegration of the Warsaw block and the finale of which was the USSR disintegration according to lines of demarcation of the national republics. The ethnic factor being used by V.I. Lenin, his associates and successors for achieving their purposes to disintegrate "the old world" in the one sixth part of the planet in 70 years of the Soviet government and the communist ideology was the reason for the disintegration of the first state of the workers and peasants. "The manned ethnicity" coming to a decorative national façade in the soviet enclaves and fifteen variants of the slogan "Workers of the world, unite!" on the emblem of the USSR turned out to be the decade of the dramatic shocks for peoples - the inhabitants of the post-soviet area.
According to the expert, Syzdykova, "... the countries of Central Asia became the agenda of a new "big play" where not only the great states are involved in but also the regional "centers of a force" of the middle level. If in XIX- at the beginning of XX century the Russian and the Britain empires were the main players then now they are the Russian Federation, USA, China, Turkey, Iran, India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and, of course, the European countries to a varying degree". Today it's universally admitted that the post-soviet Central Asia is the zone of the interethnic tension. And the history of the national formation during 20-3 0-ss of the past century is the main reason for that in future like in near past this region can be a seat of inter-confessional and interethnic cataclysm (more catastrophic in comparison with the beginning and the middle of 90-ss) threatening a stability all over the Eurasian post-soviet area. Many modern experts of CA agree that at the present the international and the ethnic lines don't coincide in the region as they were in many respects artificially and voluntarily formed. "During the soviet period the embryonic nations-states were formed based on a combination of ethno-language principles for economic practicability. However, in reality their boundaries were artificial to a great extent. For example, Bukhara and Samarkand where % of the citizens are the Tajik (for the moment of a demarcation) were included in Uzbekistan but the Fergana valley with the Uzbek population was divided between Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. Thereby, one prepared the ground for potential conflicts which were especially pronounced in the Fergana valley. The ethnic confrontations in the Fergana valley are associated, first of all, with the water resource problem. The conflict between the Tajik of Isfarinskogo area Hujandskoy oblast of Tajikistan and the Kyrgyz of Batkenskogo of Oshskoy oblast in Kyrgyzstan gave rise to the serious disagreements between two neighboring republics in 1988. So, the problems on water
use and water distribution together with the territorial problems have the serious effect on the international relations and cause numerous conflicts.
At the beginning of 90-ss of XX century when there emerged the situation over the post-soviet area according to a type "live as you like but I am not here" just Central Asia and Transcaucasia felt badly a void of forsakenness on the side of "elder brother" - Russia. If the Baltic countries have quickly refused from the soviet heritage took the take of integration into the European communities without any qualms and spur of the moment, having clearly defined their civilized and ethno-cultural preferences then their eastern and the southern colleagues of "sovereignty parade" turned to be in the grave situation. The region according to the soviet ideology entered directly socialism from feudalism at once having jumped the whole socioeconomic formation was notable for a very discrepancy of their development: on the one hand the experts note pro-communist orthodoxy but on the other hand -patriarchal-feudal and even ancestral-tribal relations almost in a state of nature continue to be developed. Industrialization was artificial during the Soviet government not taking into consideration the interests of the republics themselves but according to Center's diktat. Nobody gained own national personnel potential in the sphere of production during the Soviet Government in Central Asia - the workplaces in the sphere associated with a high qualification and technologies were preferably taken by the representatives of the Russian and the Russian-language population - product of "special-purpose labor migration", personnel policy conducted by the party leadership of Moscow.
The outflow of brainpower and skilled workers - the Russians, the Ukrainians, the Byelorussians, the Tatars and etc. - to the "historical homeland" inevitably followed after the USSR disintegration brought to the industrial collapse in the new independent republics of Central
Asia and together with super-tension of the ethnic field gave a picture of a system crisis being spread the region being fluctuated during 90-ss. No doubt that just common people experienced severities of the crisis in Central Asia - equally the "titular" and "non-titular", however, the representatives of the clannish top having seized power in the republics sensed a degree of their "forlornness" to the full.
The governments of the new independent states having revealed themselves on the world map found themselves at the crossroads of their life; it concerned not only a choice of a development path but purely biological-evolutional conditions: "to be or not to be?" Under these conditions the political elites in Central Asia were launched a historical challenge against each group of the leaders met in its own way. But as a whole, the political transformation of central-Asian elite resulted in the common and the concrete enough trends. Just ethnic map became the main dominant in the political regimes developing in Central Asia during the post-soviet period. Many experts describe the regimes formed in the given region as ethnocratic. The majority of the experts associate the phenomenon itself of ethno-nationalism with the accelerated process of the national consolidation when the ethno-genesis processes relatively the young national "ethnic" groups are in unfinished state, when the national self-consciousness transformation takes a form of exaggerated nationalism and national chauvinism.
So, one can explain "extremes" in ethno-policy of the states in Central Asia as a consequence of "growing pains". Just from this point of view one can explain obvious or secret policy of the ruling regimes in Central Asia pursued at the end of 80-ss of XX century for "ejection" of the Russian-speaking part of the population, struggle for "nation purity", personnel policy in the sphere of nation-building when "titular" citizens are given preferences in appointment to the key posts in the state to the prejudice of the national minorities. The trend to nation-
building according to Unitarianism model is directly associated with a phenomenon of ethnocratia in the most republics of the given region. For example, according to Constitution of Kyrgyzstan dated 5 May 1993 it's declared as "sovereign, unitary, democratic republic built on the principles of legal, secular state". The Constitution of Tajikistan echoes it word by word. Whether or no the vast majority of the region state declares the unitarity of their state system except Uzbekistan which even if formally but confirms the sovereignty of the republic Karakalpakstan up to the right for its leaving "based on general referendum of the people of Karakalpakstan".
By the beginning of the third millennium the picture of "rebel Asia" became more or less clear. The main development paths of all the post-soviet republics of Central Asia were defined at the background of a relative stabilization of the situation in the region.
The variant of a development according to "bananas republic" (by analogy with Latin American countries of the first half of the past century) having all the necessary attributes - a strict authoritarian regime, depressive economy concentrating on raw materials sphere, a low standard of life for the vast majority of the population and the dependence on policy of the major world powers (first of all, on USA, more and more paving the way for the region developing). One can rate Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan to this type, of course, taking into consideration the concrete differences in their path of development. For example, for Turkmenistan it's a neutrality hardly being proclaimed and finding a way around between USA and Russia associated with heavy stocks of strategically important hydrocarbon resources, besides, -political instability because of Turkmenbashi's death. As for ethno-policy such states are characterized with differences from the Russians and the Russian-language communities' "forcing out" to playing to the gallery with them in dependence of the external economic situation.
Steadily progressive path of development clearly defined by Kazakhstan's Government - integration into the international community and not unfounded claims to a leadership in the region, a rapid growth of gross domestic product taking the lead over the Russian indexes. Thereat, the rapid paces of economic growth and the country potential combine strict enough authoritarian trends being typical for the regime of Nazarbaev and a consistent though not being declared course for derussification of the socio-political and cultural life of the country (adoption of the Cyrillic alphabet, personnel policy and etc.) As a whole, the regime being typical for Kazakhstan can be characterized as "educated authoritarianism" with ethnic tint. One observes a restrained policy approving a deviation from the pro-Russian course more clearly what is evidence of increasing ambitions of our Asiatic neighbor and its attempts to position itself as a new super state.
Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan can be related to the republics "not finding their position". The political processes there aren't legalized because of high instability of the general situation. The ethnic conflict factor prevails. The negative moments become stronger because of the active interference of Afghanistan and the other Islamic countries into the internal political situation in the given republics, geopolitical claim increasing of China closely observing the situation of "noisy" neighbors and USA's interference in their internal affairs performing the variants of "orange" and other "color" revolutions in the regions (as it is problematic).
As a whole one can note that in spite of the above-mentioned relative stabilization in the region Central Asia will be the center of interethnic tension and the object of close attention from the party of both "old" and emerging "new" world states during near decade. The ethnic and confessional problems (mainly associated with aggressive Islamism seeking in the northern regions) are associated with the
economic interests of rapidly developing countries of Asia (China, India, Pakistan and others) being drawn towards expansion in the given region of CIS. Central Asia is also a traditional goalpost in the foreign policy of Turkey which in spite of its integration in Europe and NATO continues pretending to a geopolitical dominance in the zone of the primary living of the Turkic ethnos.
In this situation Russia faces a very difficult choice. On the one hand, the Russian Federation as the state-leader in the structure of CIS and the official legal successor of USSR can't but pretending to a traditional dominance in Central Asia; it follows from the logic of the Russian foreign policy development during several last centuries. "Supervision" policy continuation the restless "junior brothers" is dictated also by strategic reasons and the needs of the national security -it can't be another situation when the countries of NATO headed by USA are aiming for the Russian borders trying to "bar" it both west and east. On the other hand, one should also take into account that the Russian Federation left its hold of the situation in Central Asia to a great extent because of the political mistakes in the foreign-policy course of the Russian leaders in 1990-ss. Almost demonstrative indifference to a lot of "junior brothers" left to their fate, indifference to fates of the Russian and the Russian-language communities left out Russia brought to miserable results. Both our traditional and newly emerged competitors rushed in the niche left vacant and began pretending to a leadership in the region. And now one should take into account a factor of the other forces when trying to build up the new relationship with the south-eastern neighbors.
As a whole one should acknowledge that Russia came to the original deadlock having oriented at the West in the foreign policy for years. Russia, nevertheless, didn't become a part of Europe having westernized somehow the economic life and the public institutions. We
ignored the appeals from the East (in particular, from Nazarbaev) to implement so-called Eurasian project together. Now, having disappointed in the pro-western policy (what was inevitable) we face with the situation when "one is sick and tired to wait" for us and the states of USA try to demonstrate their independence on the foreign-policy course of Russia in a varying degree.
"Problemy vostokovedeniya, M, 2010, N 3 (49), p. 63-66.
Parag Khanna, political scientist (the USA) KAZAKHSTAN: A LOT OF PIPELINES BRING IN GOOD FORTUNE
Many centuries ago the countries received the geopolitical advantages at the expense of trade routes, while at present the control over the gas and oil pipelines ensures incomes and political connections. The aggregate oil reserves in the Caspian Basin are estimated in the sum exceeding 200 billion barrels (comparing with 600 billion barrels of explored and blocked-out reserves in the Persian Gulf), attaching great importance to the whole region as an alternative source of oil for the West and the East. Like Saudi Arabia, Kazakhstan became an energy storeroom, and therefore all superpowers try to get it for themselves. Kazakhstan located on the vast territory of fruitless steppes, formerly easily conquered by Chinghiz khan in his time, is the biggest country of the world, which has no exit to the ocean. Since the time of getting independence Kazakhstan used its geography and geology as blessings and started to write its annals of success. At present, it can not even be compared with its weaker southern
