Even with a buffoon in the White House and an assertive Russia under Putin, the latter remains vulnerable in Central Asia where the US has much room for mischief.
For decades the Saudis have peddled their narrow-minded nonsense as ideology by disbursing petrodollars. Given its disastrous consequences for the Ummah, this no longer works even with its own agents.
At first glance there appears nothing unusual about the ruling party's "landslide victory" in the March 1 parliamentary elections in Tajikistan. All authoritarian regimes, in Central Asia as elsewhere, use "elections" as an administrative tool to formalize their grip on power.
