Security challenges in the Caucasus and Central Asia

Assessing the external security dimension, we have to distinguish between the relevant inside-out as well as the outside-in dynamics. Afghanistan will continue to pose a long-term outside-in threat. It's particularly the impact of the ongoing drug traffic that seriously destabilizes the transit countries by strenghtening the 'state gone mafia' cancer and the social impact of drug abuse. Afghan opium production contributed to a 600-fold increase in AIDS cases in Central Asia from 1994 to 2001, of which 88 percent were related to injected drug use. The HIV/AIDS infection rate in Central Asia is currently increasing at the fastest pace in the world.

Both regions are affected by unconstructive foreign intervention perpetuating instability and inhibiting the conflict resolution processes. While avoiding regional security through regional cooperation and striving for different, partly antagonistic outside actors, the governing elites in their will to stay in power at times are taken hostages of outside influence. In this regard, Russian interference in managing the frozen conflicts in the region has to be explicitly mentioned. The competetive nature of tapping and transporting the hydrocarbon energy resources of the Caspian region coupled with partly exclusive foreign policy concepts are reproducing and strenghtening perceptions of antagonistic axes dividing the region.

The positive and negative impact of the war on terrorism has already been mentioned. While diminishing some security threats from outside, it did contribute to an increasing authoritarianism. Supporting these reigns in the name of fighting terrorism and fostering stabilization actually results in fostering terrorism and increasing a creeping destabilization. Looking at the inside-out security dynamics, the Caucasus-Centra Asia area has the potential to destabilize neighboring countries and regions by a mixture of state failure, escalating violent conflicts leading to entanglement of outside actors, and terrorist threats. Both regions are neighbors of Russia among others and thus directly affect the whole European security order. The terrorist threat includes unsecured nuclear materials for a dirty bomb, and the potential of remote areas being used as safehaven for terrorist cells.