Window on Eurasia

Because of family medical matters, I am indefinitely suspending my production of Windows on Eurasia. Over the course of almost seven years, I have thoroughly enjoyed producing more than 5500 of them and especially receiving the many comments from all of you that have made me feel part of a larger community. I thus sign off for the present at least with both regrets and thanks. Paul Goble

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 8 – Even if conditions in post-Soviet Central Asia and the Caucasus are so different from those in the Arab world that a repetition of an Arab Spring there remains unlikely, the authoritarian rulers in these two regions are sufficiently nervous about popular unrest that they are looking to Moscow for possible support in the event of disorders.

Indeed, according to an article by Viktoriya Panfilova in today’s “Nezavisimaya gazeta,” Russian and Uzbek experts... Читать дальше...

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 7 – A member of the Federation Council has called for the restoration of the tsarist-era system of katorga under which those guilty of especially serious crimes such a terrorism, drug dealing or child murders would be sentenced to harsh physical labor without the possibility of commutation of sentence, or the right of correspondence.

Aleksey Aleksandrov, chairman of the Federation Council’s committee on constitutional law, speaking at a congress of jurists... Читать дальше...

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 7 – In a startling demonstration of the spread of new technologies to the North Caucasus, the leaders of the Salafi trend in Islam in Daghestan, one at odds with the dominant Sufi trend there and often associated with political radicalism, used the flashmob technique to bring 5,000 young people into the streets of Makhachaka last week.

In reporting on this event, which was staged in order to demonstrate to visitors from Moscow that people in that republic... Читать дальше...

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 7 – The non-Russian countries in the post-Soviet space are more or less quickly “liberating themselves from the Soviet and Imperial past,” but the Russians have not found a way – or do not want to find one – to do the same thing, according to a leading Moscow specialist on contemporary history.

In yesterday’s “Novaya gazeta,” Gennady Bordyugov, a member of the RIA Novosti council of experts, sums up the findings of his latest book, “Memory Wars on the Post-Soviet Space” (in Russian... Читать дальше...

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 6 – Anecdotes about leaders and policies have long been an important part of Russian life, but the Internet is transforming its form and content because falling prices for connectivity are increasing the number of users and rising download speeds are making video clips more widely accessible, according to a Moscow commentator.

On the “Russky zhurnal” portal, Aleksandr Chausov argues that at present Russians are “observing an evolution of the form of jokes... Читать дальше...

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 6 – Six months after the clashes in Manezh Square, radical Russian nationalists groups are increasing their activity, supported by the increasing number of ethnic Russians who feel that they are second class citizens in their own country because the powers that be are giving more support to North Caucasians and Central Asian immigrants.

In an article in Friday’s “Nezavisimaya gazeta” entitled “Russians Feel a Sense of National Inequality in Their Own Country,”... Читать дальше...

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 6 – In the run-up to local elections in Moldova yesterday, some politicians sought to exploit Chisinau’s March 14th decision to register a Muslim group thereby making it appear that Moldova is riven by “a clash of civilizations” -- even though Moldova has only 300 Muslims and even though few objected when the registration decision was originally made.

In an essay on Win.ru, Irina Katanina sorts out this discussion which has attracted some attention abroad... Читать дальше...

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 4 – In the wake of Georgia’s recognition of the Circassian genocide, the head of the Volga Center of Regional and Ethno-Religious Research says, “it cannot be excluded” that there will soon be similar “campaigns” seeking similar international recognition of Russian-conducted genocides against the peoples of the Middle Volga and Siberia.

In an essay on the “Novoye Vostochnoye Obozreniye” portal yesterday, Rais Suleymanov whose center is part of the Russian... Читать дальше...

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 3 – Young Russians increasingly deify Stalin not only because he represents a system radically different from that of Russia today but also because the contemporary Russian state has failed to offer a specific ideological alternative that is not mired in abstraction, accord to two Russian scholars.

In the course of a St. Petersburg conference last week on “Russian Self-Consciousness and the Space of Russia,” which concluded that this consciousness today is... Читать дальше...