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Russian Policy Toward Central Asia: Tools for Integration and Arguments for Security Involvement
8 March, 2012 @ 6:30 PM - 8:00 PM
Alexey Malashenko, Scholar-in-Residence, Carnegie Center, Moscow and Professor, Moscow State Institute of International Relations
Russia is trying to preserve its influence in Central Asia, and for a few years has actively promoted integrative strategies in the framework of the Customs Union, and the Eurasian Union project. Sofar these structures are dominated mostly by the bilateral Russia-Kazakhstan relationship, while theother potential partners, above all Uzbekistan, have had a skeptical position toward Russia’sinitiatives. Older projects such as the Eurasian Economic Union and the Collective Security TreatyOrganization are viewed in the region as instruments of Russia’s influence. Central Asian governments are weary of these initiatives as they are trying not to be pressured by Moscow. Accordingly, Moscow does not have a lot of tools at its disposal to influence the domestic and foreign strategies of the Central Asian states. However, the Russian elites are increasingly concernedabout Central Asia as a zone of potential conflict and about the possible spread of militant Islamicgroups, using labor migrants as a way of penetrating Russia’s territory.
Alexey Malashenko is Scholar-in-Residence for the Religion, Society, and Security Program at theCarnegie Center in Moscow. He has also been a professor at Moscow State Institute of InternationalRelations, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation (MGIMO) since 2000. He has written and co-authored many books on religion in Russia and the near-abroad, including The IslamicFactor in the Northern Caucasus and The Muslim Community of the CIS.
