In January 2025, the research papers produced by the PSCR program covered the developments in such subregions as the South Caucasus, the Baltics, Central Asia, and Russia.
Kiryl Kascian overviews the situation concerning LRT, Lithuania’s public broadcasting corporation. Recently, a populist, far-right party, “Nemunas Dawn,” which gained a chance to enter the ruling coalition because of the extreme pluralism in the Lithuanian party landscape, proposed amendments to the law concerning the broadcaster status. The amendments would facilitate the removal of LRT’s Director General and thus diminish the independence of the media corporation. Opposition parties responded with filibustering tactics, and civil society organized rallies to protect media freedom from infringements, while also speculating about the personal aspects of the desire to oust the incumbent Director General. Eventually, the government decided not to fast-track the legislative amendments.
Against the background of the recently announced changes in the regulations concerning the official Russian migration policy, Alexander Shpunt outlines the main milestones in the development of a stable Vietnamese diaspora in Russia. He stresses the initially temporary character of Vietnamese migration based on the agreements between Vietnam and the Soviet Union, with subsequent turning of a part of the Vietnamese workers into an element of the “shadow market,” and main channels for the Vietnamese workforce to enter the Russian economy in the post-Soviet period. The demographic characteristics and networked human capital allowed for the creation of a stable and resilient migrant community that, at the same time, remains highly dependent on “exploitative market regimes” and “opportunistic criminals.” Based on the above, the author doubts that, after working in Russia, “new Vietnamese migrants (…) will all return to Vietnam” – and this conclusion may be extrapolated to other potential migrant communities from the “far abroad.”
The PSCRP team summarizes the strategic choices Armenia is facing at the moment. The authors view the country as caught between competing geopolitical ambitions, but at the same time, facing the prospect of tangible positive changes. The latter are, however, highly dependent on the position of the incumbent leader, Nikol Pashinyan, and the upcoming constitutional referendum. In the meantime, Moscow and Tehran are trying to exert influence on the political decisions made in Yerevan, and the Armenian diaspora is now acting against the changes envisioned by the Pashinyan administration. The authors conclude that “Armenia must end its strategic ambiguity and demonstrate that it is prepared to anchor itself in the Western orbit. And the West must be prepared to support that choice with more than rhetoric.”
Vladimir (Ze’ev) Khanin analyzes how the current wave of anti-government protests in Iran is viewed in Russia and Ukraine. The position of Kyiv is a vocal support for the potential revolution, since Iran is regarded as the main ally of Russia and one of its major arms suppliers. Moscow’s position is more complicated, since, although officially being Tehran’s ally, with multiple documents signed regarding this alliance, the official Kremlin maintains rather restrained rhetoric and avoids undertaking any sustained practical steps. This may be motivated by Moscow’s unwillingness to enter into direct conflict with the Trump administration, and by the arguments of Russia’s oil lobby. Russia’s reaction is mostly confined to diplomatic efforts aimed at the conflict de-escalation. The Israeli position is no less ambiguous, because of the presumed insufficient readiness of the Jewish state to debunk possible Iranian attacks, and the fears that the ayatollah regime is not weakened enough to fall because of external action.
Gershon Kogan thoroughly analyzes the strategic anxiety that Israeli-Azerbaijanian cooperation creates for Iran’s regional security considerations. Amid the internal crisis, Tehran’s sensitivity to external reference points is heightened, and Baku is perceived there as a “structurally inconvenient reference point,” whose very existence challenges the narrative of the “presumed inseparability of Shi‘ite identity from Islamic governance and clerical authority.” The outcome of the recent wars in Karabakh, influenced, inter alia, by Baku’s cooperation with Israel, meant a qualitative shift in Tehran’s northern security environment. For Jerusalem, strategic cooperation with Azerbaijan, which has a long border with Iran, is, among other things, a tool to generate “a persistent sense of strategic uncertainty in Tehran.”
Andrey Kazantsev-Vaisman outlines the opportunities that are now emerging for Israeli foreign policy in Central Asia. While the relations with Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan are already well-developed, especially upon the former’s accession to the Abraham Accords, the broader regional diplomatic efforts by Jerusalem might mean expanding Israel’s strategic contacts in the “Islamic world.” At the moment, Turkey, Russia, and China tend to assume the position of pragmatic tolerance towards such developments, Iran is largely absorbed by its own internal challenges, and other Central Asian states closely monitor the development of Israel-Kazakhstan relations, maintaining a cautiously positive view towards following the example. The most positive scenario for Israeli diplomacy can be the establishment of a permanent consultative format with the “Central Asian Six” (where now Baku is also represented), which can be non-institutional, non-binding, demilitarized, depoliticized, and focused on economic and infrastructural development.
Vladimir (Ze’ev) Khanin further draws the readers’ attention to the recent trilateral summit Israel-Cyprus-Greece. The parties have discussed “planning large-scale joint exercises, enhancing the operational readiness of their armed forces, and exchanging intelligence”; the issues of energy trade were raised, as well as the projects for establishing TITR and IMEC economic corridors. However, it was primarily the discussions on the post-conflict arrangement of the Gaza Strip that raised significant concerns in Turkey. Ankara perceives this move “as a challenge to its aspiration to replicate in Gaza the Syrian model — that is, to establish external control over the enclave and keep in power the radical Islamist group Hamas.” As Turkey is looking for actors that might potentially support it in the confrontation “with the Athens–Jerusalem–Nicosia triangle,” it might possibly count on Moscow. However, the latter’s position is rather ambivalent: although Russia’s relations with Greece and Cyprus have deteriorated in recent years, Moscow-Ankara relations are rather cool as well, mostly because of Turkey’s cooperation with Ukraine and the US, and regional ambitions for leadership and influence in the post-Soviet space, traditionally considered by Russia as its exclusive zone of interests.
Last but not least, as always, Alexander Shpunt has prepared his monthly digest of five research publications concerning the conflict dynamics in the post-Soviet space.
We are now already working on the research papers to be published in the next few months, so as to keep the readership updated regarding the post-Soviet events.