Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia: Security Issues and Implications for U.S. Interests

The Congressional Research Service, a department of the Library of Congress, conducts research and analysis for Congress on a broad range of national and international policy issues. Some of the CRS work is carried out specifically for individual members of Congress or their staff and is confidential. However, there is also much CRS compiled material which is considered public but is not formally published on the CRS website.

For that reason a number of other organisations try to keep track of these publications and make them publicly available via their own websites. Currently, ESO uses the following websites to track these reports and allow access to them in ESO:

EveryCRSReport.com
Federation of American Scientists (FAS)

In some cases hyperlinks allows you to access all versions of a report, including the latest. Note that many reports are periodically updated.The South Caucasus region has been the most unstable in the former Soviet Union in terms of the number, intensity, and length of ethnic and civil conflicts. Other emerging or full-blown security problems include crime, corruption, terrorism, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction,
and narcotics trafficking. The regional governments have worked to bolster their security by combating terrorism, limiting political dissent they view as threatening, revamping their armed forces, and seeking outside assistance and allies.

The roles of neighbors Iran, Russia, and Turkey have been of deep security concern to one or more of the states of the region. These and other major powers, primarily the United States and European Union (EU) members, have pursued differing interests and policies toward the three states. Some officials in Russia view the region as a traditional sphere of influence, while Turkish officials tend to stress common ethnic ties with Azerbaijan and most of Central Asia.

EU members are increasingly addressing instability in what they view as a far corner of Europe. Armenia has pursued close ties with Russia and Iran in part to counter Azerbaijan’s ties with Turkey, and Georgia and Azerbaijan have stressed ties with the United States in part to bolster
their independence vis-a-vis Russia.

• Primary Source

EveryCRSReport.com https://www.everycrsreport.com/

Federation of American Scientists (FAS): Congressional Research Service [CRS] Reports https://fas.org/sgp/crs/index.html

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