All News
Every published article, newest first.
Mongolia’s two-neighbor squeeze, and the third neighbor that cannot reach it
China’s foreign minister spent three days in Ulaanbaatar this week promising railways and a shared future. The warmth is real, and so are its limits: nearly everything that should give Mongolia bargaining power, from gas transit to rare earths, is worth only what Beijing or Moscow agrees to pay for it.
An amnesty for 18,038, and a map of whom Tajikistan will not forgive
On 16 June, ahead of Tajikistan’s 35th independence anniversary, President Emomali Rahmon signed an amnesty covering 18,038 convicts, with 11,305 to be released outright. It is a large and genuine act of clemency. It is also, as these laws reliably are, built with a careful list of people it will not touch.
The Iran deal heads toward Friday’s signing with its text unpublished and both sides claiming victory
The US and Iran are preparing to sign their interim peace agreement in Switzerland on 19 June, but the deal’s text has not been published, the two governments describe its terms differently, and shippers want to see Hormuz actually reopen before they act on it.
Two forums, one pitch: the region sells resilience as the war premium fades
In the same week, Tashkent and Baku are both courting global capital on a promise of stability and integration. The timing is telling: with the Iran war ending, the region has to win capital on fundamentals again, after a season when someone else’s crisis did the selling.
Baku opens the Islamic Development Bank’s annual meetings as Gulf money eyes the region
The Islamic Development Bank Group opened its 51st annual meetings in Baku on 16 June under the banner of regional integration. For Central Asia’s member states, it is a week to court Gulf and Islamic capital close to home.
Tashkent opens its biggest investment forum yet, with a new financial center as the prize
Uzbekistan opened the fifth Tashkent International Investment Forum on 16 June, with 3,423 delegates from 100 countries and a new common-law financial center at its core. The pitch is stability and reform, sold to capital that has grown choosier about where it goes.
Russia is squeezing Tajik migrants. Dushanbe is the quiet beneficiary
This week Russia made its citizenship 12 times more expensive and all but reserved the cheap path for men willing to fight its war. The West sees victims of Moscow. It keeps missing the government in Dushanbe that needs these men gone, and needs their money home.
Kyrgyzstan and Georgia reach for a Black Sea link as the China railway advances
On the first visit to Bishkek by a Georgian head of government, Prime Minister Kobakhidze and President Japarov agreed to connect the new China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway to Georgia’s Black Sea ports. The bet is that the Middle Corridor outlasts the war that briefly made it fashionable.
Central Asia’s wartime windfall ends with the war
For 100 days the closed Gulf made Central Asia’s oil more valuable and its non-Gulf routes look wise. With Hormuz reopening, the region goes back to competing on price and reliability, with less of both than it would like.
Iran and the US agree to end the war and reopen Hormuz, and oil tumbles
President Trump declared a deal with Iran complete on 14 June, set to reopen the Strait of Hormuz after more than 100 days. Oil fell below $84 on Monday, down from a wartime peak near $126. For Central Asia, the windfall is ending with the war.
Kazakhstan’s reforms all point one way
On 12 June the party that ran Kazakhstan for a quarter of a century voted to dissolve itself into a party loyal to the sitting president. It was called renewal. It is the latest step in a steady concentration of power that the country’s reformist vocabulary keeps describing and never quite reverses.
Russia raises the price of a passport 12-fold, and waives it for soldiers
Russia’s parliament passed a law this week raising the fee for citizenship 12-fold and removing it for those who enlist to fight in Ukraine. The squeeze falls hardest on the millions of Central Asians who work there.
Kazakhstan’s ruling party votes to merge into a new pro-Tokayev party
Amanat, the party built around Nursultan Nazarbayev and in power since 1999, said at its congress on 12 June that it will merge into Adilet, a party created this year by President Tokayev’s allies. It is the clearest break yet with the Nazarbayev machine, weeks before August’s elections.
The minerals man, the Shenzhen check, and the Russian gas tap
In one week Kazakhstan hosted an American official hunting for minerals, pocketed $6 billion from a Chinese roadshow, and offered to pump more Russian gas to its neighbor. The performance was flawless. The stage is getting smaller.
Kyrgyzstan extends its timber export ban, eyeing Russian re-exports
Bishkek prolonged its ban on exporting timber outside the Eurasian Economic Union for another six months, a recurring move aimed partly at blocking the re-export of duty-free Russian wood.
Tajikistan is the EBRD’s fastest-growing regional economy, with one big catch
The EBRD’s new report puts Tajikistan among the region’s fastest growers, with first-quarter investment up 34 percent on the back of Rogun and state spending. Its weak point is the familiar one: dependence on Russian remittances.
Kazakhstan touts its titanium and pledges $470 million for exploration
On the sidelines of the Astana mining congress, officials said Kazakh titanium supplies about a fifth of the global aerospace market and pledged some 470 million dollars for geological exploration through 2028.
Kazakhstan’s Senate ratifies a border-regime deal with Uzbekistan
Kazakhstan’s Senate ratified the agreement governing the regime along its 2,356-kilometre border with Uzbekistan on 11 June, the last legal step in a demarcation the two finished in 2022.
The Iran war is redrawing Central Asia’s map to the sea
Every escalation in the Gulf pushes the region’s trade further off the route through Iran and onto the corridors west and east. The war hands Kazakhstan an oil-price windfall and a bill at the same time.
The Iran war reignites and the Strait of Hormuz shuts again
Iran and the United States traded strikes again on 11 June, and Tehran declared the Strait of Hormuz closed to all shipping. For Central Asia the effects are higher prices and a southern route to the sea that is shut once more.