2001 Reports

A Sacred Place Is Never Empty: The External Politics of the Transcaspian

Blank, Stephen

The ongoing fighting in Chechnya and Central Asia illustrates how the Russian proverb of my title (“sviatoe mesto pusto ne byvaet”) applies to the Transcaspian region. Central Asia and the Caucasus have become "sacred" battlegrounds of a new great game involving many states and movements. Thus the legal status of the Caspian Sea, a focal point of Transcaspian energy issues, "sits at the intersection of the sexiest questions in international relations."