Central Asian Countries have Exploited ‘Window of Opportunity’ Putin’s War in Ukraine has Given Them, Kyrgyz Commentator Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, July 31 – Because Moscow has been focusing so exclusively on Ukraine since Putin launched his expanded war in Ukraine in 2022, the countries of Central Asia have been able to address and solve issues that had long been considered too complicated” for any resolution, Adil Tudrukulov says.

            The five have exploited this “window of opportunity,” the Kyrgyz commentator says, to deal with complicated issues like border delimitation, building transport corridors, coordinating their policies with one another, and expanding ties with other world centers of power (exclusive.kz/ne-chuzhaja-vojna-kak-ukraina-izmenila-centralnuju-aziju).

            Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart took the lead in promoting a common front on foreign policy questions, Tudrukulov says; and Uzbekistan leader Shavkat Mirziyoyev served as “the architect of rapprochement” within the region. But the leaders of the other three countries in the region – Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan – have fully participated.

            The solution of many regional problems has further limited Russia’s influence in the region, given that many of them were of Moscow’s creation as part of its longstanding divide-and-rule strategy, the commentator continues, while acknowledging that Russian influence has not disappeared but rather has been limited by ties with other powers and a new self-confidence.

            Tudrukulov says that it remains to be seen what will happen once the war in Ukraine is concluded; but on the basis of the evidence he provides, when that does happen, one of the most important consequences of Putin’s war there may well be in Central Asia where countries are increasingly going their own way rather than remaining under Moscow.

            Indeed, the trends that the Kyrgyz analyst is pointing to mean that the war in Ukraine is yet another step toward the demise of the Muscovite empire, not only in Ukraine and not only in the former Soviet republics which gained independence in 1991 but in the other non-Russian state formations still under Moscow’s control. 

Udmurt Case Suggests Putin May No Longer Be as Committed to Naming Outsiders as Heads of Russia’s Federal Subjects

Paul Goble

            Staunton, July 30 – When Putin accepted the resignation of Udmurtia head Aleksandr Brechalov just before the Duma election and then named as his successor Olga Abramova, Russian analysts focused on the problems Brechalov has had in that Middle Volga republic and his much hinted at desire to move back to Moscow.

            But an émigré analyst suggests that the key to what has unexpectedly taken place at least as far as its timing is concerned may have been provided by Putin’s greeting to Abramova when he first met with her (wschody.net/game-changer-kak-kampaniya-za-nezavisimost-udmurtii-vybila-iz-kremlevskoj-kolody-regionalnogo-tuza/).

            When Abramova entered Putin’s office, Andrey Grigoryev says, the Kremlin leader greeted her with the words “you were born in Udmurtia, right? And then worked there almost all the time?” – inquiries that Putin may be more inclined to appoint locals as governors than he has up to now. 

            Not only does that background make Abramova very different from Brechalov who was parachuted into Udmurtia by Putin as what Russians call “a Varangian” or outsider, but it also and apparently not coincidentally comes after moves by the Udmurt opposition abroad to promote the idea that only Udmurts can understand Udmurt problems and only they have the right to resolve them.

            Earlier this summer, Grigoryev points out, “a group of political emigres from the republic initiative the Udmurtia is a Free Country campaign” to promote the idea that their homeland must escape from Moscow’s control. To that end, the group announced as an alternative to the Duma vote, the election of an independent council of the peoples of Udmurtia.

            That vote is slated to take place the same day Moscow will be holding all-Russian Duma elections; but this special Udmurt election will feature one major difference: Its organizers say that “only those who are directly related to Udmurtia and the Udmurt nation have the right to decide the fate of the republic,” the commentator says.

            Putin’s words to Abramova seem to be a kind of Kremlin response to this move and an indication that in the face of political pressure from below, the Russian president may be less committed to appointing outsiders than he has been up to now lest that practice spark more resistance to them and to himself than would otherwise be the case.

            If that proves to be the case, then what has happened in Udmurtia may be “the game changer” that Grigoryev suggests. 

Moscow Opposition Figures Tried to Tell Protesters at Shiyes How to Act, But the Latter Pursued Their Own Program and Won Out, Solovyova Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, July 30 – Eight years ago, “one of the most high-profile, and most importantly successful protests in Russia began against the construction of a garbage dump at the Shiyes station” in Arkhangelsk Oblast, Elena Solovyova recalls. Their actions attracted the attention of people across Russia and around the world.

            But the Komi Daily journalist says that some Moscow liberals thought it was their job to tell the Shiyes protesters how to act. Fortunately, she continues, those taking part, from both the Komi Republic and Arkhangelsk Oblast, ignored that advice, continued on their own course, and won out (komidaily.com/2026/07/30/vosem-let-protestu-na-shiese/).

            Not everyone in Moscow behaved that way; but enough did, reflecting imperialist and paternalist attitudes of some of them to anyone from beyond the capital’s ring road that have limited the ability of many in Moscow to take seriously and work closely with people many Muscovites see as provincial.

            The Shiyes protests “revealed this colonial attitude very clearly,” Solovyova says. “And now, when eight years have past since they began, it is important to remember why the environmental protest against the construction of a trash dump became an anti-colonial one as well.”

            That the Putin regime and its supporters always viewed the Shiyes project as a colonial one was obvious from the beginning, she continues. Putin and his people talked about the need to shift trash away from where people lived and put It somewhere on the periphery.

            But they ignored the fact that there were people in precisely the areas Moscow wanted to put trash and that their interests needed to be protected to. That is what Shiyes showed, and that is why eight years on it must be seen as a powerful anti-colonial action, Solovoyova continues.

            Many Russian opposition figures in Moscow understand this, but a significant fraction of them still do not. They aren’t ready for people “from the provinces” to act on their own in defense of their interests and insist that such “second-class” people must subordinate themselves to the Moscow opposition.

            Had the protesters done so, they wouldn’t have created the powerful environmental defense party that these Muscovites promised. They would have given up without the victory that they won by continuing to protest. Looking back, Solovoyova says, that is what must be remembered now and in the future.

            For background on how environmental protests in regions became both political and more effective than what the Moscow opposition has tried, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/04/environmental-activism-often-seedbed-of.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2020/11/environmental-protests-in-russian.html,  windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2020/11/shiyes-protesters-victories-affecting.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2020/08/as-at-end-of-soviet-times-mass-actions.html.