Drought, Coming on Top of Pandemic, Threatens Political Instability in Central Asia and Russia, El Murid Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, July 1 – Droughts often produce political instability, Anatoly Nesmiyan who writes under the screen name El Murid says. A drought in the Middle East from 2008 through 2010 played a key role in triggering the Arab Spring there because of rising prices for and shortages of food.

            There is now a risk that the drought both Central Asia and central Russia are suffering, a drought that comes on top of the pandemic, could have a similar effect, becoming the event that crystallizes popular unhappiness to the point that the powers that be will not be able to contain that (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=60DDE9804F603).

            In general, he says, “weather-based cataclysms always entail an essential increase in risks of social and political crises and catastrophes, especially when all conditions for them have grown.” Russia is facing a new upsurge in the coronavirus pandemic, and Central Asia is facing the new rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan.

            Where the crisis will break out is far from clear, El Murid says. It may even occur far from the regions directly affected but where price rises or shortages caused by the drought nonetheless have an impact. That was the case with the Arab Spring which broke out not in the places hit hardest by the drought but in Tunisia which wasn’t but suffered from price increases.

            Both Central Asia and Russia are suffering from the drought and its consequences. The big question is whether the governments in these two places have sufficient administrative capacity to control the situation or whether there will be something like a Central Asian or Russian variant of the Arab Spring in their futures in the next few months.

            Typically when droughts happen, they hit hardest in the fall because it is then that supplies of food from the previous year run out as people expect to have new harvests to fall back on. If those harvests are too small, there won’t be enough food and prices will rise and shortages appear.

            That means, although the commentator doesn’t specify this, that the most dangerous period for a drought-induced explosion will come in about two months and last into the winter.