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How a Trump presidency could impact the South Caucasus
Breaking news

How a Trump presidency could impact the South Caucasus

US President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed foreign policy positions have often been vague, but can generally be understood as being based on a larger pivot toward isolationism. US disengagement from the South Caucasus, or an actual policy of tacit approval for authoritarianism, will redefine Washington’s role in the region. Trump is not known for his detailed foreign policy positions in general, and much less when it comes to the regions of the world considered more peripheral to US interests,

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Robin Fabbro
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• 10 min read
Mirhafiz Jafarzade. Courtesy photo.
Azerbaijan

Azerbaijan sentences Talysh activist to 16 years in prison for treason

Ethnic Talysh activist Mirhafiz Jafarzade, who advocated for the creation of Talysh school textbooks in Azerbaijan, has been sentenced to 16 years in prison on charges of treason.  Jafarzade, who is also a Russian citizen, was found guilty of treason in the form of espionage on Thursday. Jafarzade was detained by the authorities in November 2022. That day, pro-government media reported that the trial had determined that Jafarzade worked ‘in secret cooperation with foreign special services

Cars at a standstill on the Lachin Corridor, as the population of Nagorno-Karabakh flees to Armenia. Photo: Marut Vanyan/OC Media.
Armenia

Russia praises Azerbaijan’s ‘constructive’ approach to return of Nagorno-Karabakh refugees

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova has said Azerbaijan is taking ‘constructive’ actions to facilitate the right to return of Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians, as evidence mounts of the demolition of residential and cultural heritage buildings in Nagorno-Karabakh.  ‘We have repeatedly commented on and emphasised the constructive steps taken by Baku to provide the population that left their native places with the opportunity to return there’, Zakharova said during a press briefing o

Illustration: Tamar Shvelidze/OC Media.
2024 Georgian Parliamentary Elections

Ranking Georgia’s political parties by gender balance in the 2024 elections

Georgia’s parliamentary elections on 26 October, unlike the previous vote, will be held without any gender quotas. As women’s representation in Georgian politics remains an issue, we have examined the electoral lists of all the major parties and groupings and ranked them based on how many women they included — and how highly they were placed. The ruling Georgian Dream party pushed through mandatory gender quotas ahead of the 2020 parliamentary and 2021 local elections in an apparent bid to pro

Podcasts

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2024 Georgian Parliamentary Elections

Podcast | Georgia gears up for the 2024 parliamentary elections

With Georgia’s parliamentary elections inching closer, both the ruling Georgian Dream party and the many groups representing the opposition are scrambling to prepare for the critical vote on 26 October. This week, OC Media’s Robin Fabbro, Mariam Nikuradze, and Shota Kincha discuss how the pre-election campaign period has been going, claims of electoral violations by Georgian Dream, and the atmosphere in Georgia ahead of the vote. Read more: * Who’s who in Georgia’s pa

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Opinion

Ketevan Chachava Illustration: Tamar Shvelidze/OC Media
2024 Georgian Parliamentary Elections

Opinion | Georgia’s new electronic voting system comes with risks

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by Ketevan Chachava

The deployment of new electronic voting systems in Georgia as the country faces a critical election brings with it a number of risks.  With less than a month to go before the 2024 parliamentary elections on 26 October, Georgia’s voters are facing a critical juncture with the potential to transform the country’s immediate and long-term future. Alongside an unprecedented political landscape and a first ever fully proportional election, voters will also be faced with large-scale use of electron

The author, and a Ukrainian-Chechen protest in Sheffield.
Chechnya

Opinion | Fighting on two fronts: Chechen activists in the West

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by Ayman Eckford

Exiled from their republic due to threats to their lives, Chechen activists in the West navigate a difficult balance between visibility and caution, facing erasure by both Russian and Western society. However, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine might offer Chechnya and its activists a shift in the tides.  ‘Ukraine’s incredible incursion into the Kursk region made me finally believe that Russia could soon be defeated’. This is what Ali Bakaev, a Chechen online activist who now lives in London tells m

Erdogan and Aliyev. Illustration: Tamar Shvelidze/OC Media
Azerbaijan–Israel Relations

Opinion | Azerbaijan’s cooling relations with Turkey

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by Bahruz Samadov

Bahruz Samadov submitted this article shortly before his arrest on 21 August. He was charged with treason on 23 August, and could face 12–20 years in prison or a life sentence if found guilty. Despite long being ‘brotherly’ nations, the Israel-Gaza war appears to have exacerbated existing tensions between Turkey and Azerbaijan, potentially pushing the two countries apart irrevocably.  In recent months, relations between Azerbaijan and Turkey have been uncharacteristically cool. To observers

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