The German city of Essen, representing the wider Ruhrgebiet region, is one of Europe’s capitals of culture in 2010. The EU-sanctioned designation is enabling Germany to showcase the social and economic transformation of an area that just a few decades ago threatened to become a Rust Belt.
The Pentagon is preparing to embark on a mini-building boom in Central Asia. A recently posted sources-sought survey indicates the US military wants to be involved in strategic construction projects in all five Central Asian states, including Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
When members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization convene June 9 in Tashkent for their annual summit, it is already apparent that expansion will be a major topic of discussion.
The early April upheaval in Kyrgyzstan is helping to define what the Collective Security Treaty Organization is, and is not. The Russia-led alliance is definitely not an instrument that can be depended upon by authoritarian-minded leaders in Central Asia to prop up their regimes during times of trouble.
For the leaders of Central Asian states surrounding Kyrgyzstan, the early April upheaval in Bishkek constitutes a nightmare scenario: an angry mob looting the capital, marching on the seat of government and driving an authoritarian-minded leader from power.
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon began his first official Central Asian tour in Ashgabat on April 1. He is expected to focus on improving regional cooperation, disarmament, and environmental issues.
Yet advocacy groups fear Ban will miss an opportunity to address the region's dismal human rights record.
Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan have gone on a weapons spending spree over the past decade, collectively increasing their defense spending five-fold, according to a report recently released by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
A company with ties to Blackwater, the controversial private security firm now known as Xe, has been ferrying US government-directed cargos over the past five-plus years across Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The US State Department noted some modest improvements in human rights conditions in Central Asia in its annual Human Rights Report, although, overall, the region remained one of the worst in the world in terms of respecting basic freedoms.
China wants to build a high-speed railway across Central Asia, a leading Chinese rail expert says.
Wang Mengshu told the South China Morning Post that Beijing plans to link the Western Chinese city of Urumqi with Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. The railway could later be extended to Europe.
"China's overseas high-speed rail projects serve two purposes.
