Kyrgyz Unrests Reveals New Great Game

The violent ethnic unrest at the Kyrgyz-Uzbek border, which has killed hundreds and displaced more than a quarter of a million people over the past few days, is not simply a political crisis that is turning into a humanitarian tragedy. Instead, it represents the latest drama in the Great Game dominating Central Asia and beyond for more than two centuries.

Just as tsarist Russia and imperial Britain carved out spheres of interest in the 19th century, Moscow and Beijing are vying for geopolitical hegemony in the 21st. Paradoxically, at a time when the US and other western countries speak of a “multi-partner world”, we are seeing the rise of old eastern empires dressed in new clothes. This disproves the claim that the world will gradually converge towards a universal model of liberal market democracy.