After collapse of the USSR and the crash of the Communist regime, a prospect of direct military aggression against Russia became remote. However, preventing and repulsing of non-traditional threats are playing a growing role in ensuring the security of the country. In addition to internal challenges which are fraught with instability, economic crises, social problems, environmental degradation, ethnic conflicts and separatist movements, the assurance of Russia's security includes the neutralization of dangerous impulses coming from the former Soviet Union. Outbursts of violence, trafficking in drugs and arms, terrorism which already emerged in some regions at the Southern flank of the former USSR, mass migration, environmental degradation all of that have a direct bearing on Russia's national security, irrespective of where such developments may arise and take root.

The sources of threats just mentioned, as well as other non-traditional threats and factors of instability, influence Russia's security in different ways. The following typology could be helpful for classification of these problems, arranging them in three main groups in the order of their importance:

1. The first category is THREATS, i.e. developments that may cause direct danger to Russia's national security and thus call for an immediate active response to neutralize them, including the use of force. Among such threats that have already acquired a clear-cut international dimension are terrorism, and drugs dealing, and the growth of other forms of organized crime.

2. The next category is CHALLENGES. This term implies developments which are capable of affecting the situation in Russia and have a serious destabilizing potential. To deal with them, a whole set of long-term efforts, mainly economic, political and humanitarian is usually needed. Massive influxes of immigrants and refugees from Transcaucasia and Central Asia are typical examples of non-traditional challenges that Russia faces.

3. And at last, RISKS which may present the negative side effects of economic activities, first of all environmental degradation, as well as dissemination of infectious diseases, etc. Dealing with these sometimes necessitates adjustments of political and economic strategies.

The rise of non-traditional threats, challenges and risks has worsened considerably the security environment of the Russian Federation. This is partly a result of long years of the Communist rule, but also consequences of new global, regional and local factors which have emerged in the 1990s.

Threats: drugs dealing, terrorism and organized crime

Due to a complex of reasons - the wars in Tajikistan, and Chechnya and the one waged over Nagorny Karabakh, aggravated socio-economic problems, massive corruption, proximity to Afghanistan and to other sources of tension - a number of states of the Southern Tier have turned into a source of new non-traditional threats. A large-scale underground market of weapons and drugs has been formed there, and several new routes for drug transportation to Russia and Europe pass through these regions. Drug trafficking and illegal weapons circulation give rise to most dangerous forms of organized crime engulfing both Russia and these countries. The wars in Tajikistan and Chechnya stimulated the emergence of political terrorism, connected in many ways with the spread of Islamic extremism in the neighboring regions. A particular danger for Russia is resulting from the stepped-up activity of extremists in Dagestan.

One of Russia's most serious, if not the most serious non-traditional threat, is the spirafing consumption of drugs, their illegal production and marketing. According to Russia's Ministry of Internal Affairs, the number of regular drug addicts in the Russian Federation had more than doubled by the beginning of 1996 as against the 1985 figure, topping the two million mark. The same source says that in 1996 from 22 to 24 million people had a drug-taking experience (one-sixth of the country's total population), with 7 to 8 million taking drugs occasionally, and 2.1 to 2.3 million at least once a week (1).

A particularly disquieting aspect is that most of the drug users are adolescents and young people. Over the first six month of 1996 alone, the number of registered drug addicts in this age bracket rose from 90,000 to 130,000 (2). According to the estimates of the Russian special agencies, drugs trafficked in 1996-97 reached 500-600 tons per year (3). More than 91 per cent of cases of AIDS contamination registered in 1997 falls on drug addicts (4). Heroin is increasingly coming to dominate the drugs supply pouring into Russia from abroad (mostly via Central Asia and Transcaucasia). Experts predict a further growth of illegal trafficking in drugs in Russia unless radical measures are taken. They cannot be effective without joined efforts by Russia and the neighboring states, and without the allocation of considerable funds for this purpose. However, the prospects are not optimistic. All that gives very reason to believe that spiraling drug consumption is among the most acute new threats to the national security of Russia.

An important factor working towards a drastic worsening of the situation with drug-dealing and consumption is Russia's geographical proximity to the world's major drug-producing centers, and also the country's attractiveness both as a drugs market and as a convenient transit connection for carrying them from these drug-producing centers to Europe. Russia, dramatically increasing its contacts with the outside world and easing its border controls (which has been further facilitated by the semi-transparent borders within the CIS space), cannot therefore withstand the powerful impact of the drug-dealing interests.

Drugs are penetrating into Russia along two main channels. The first runs from the "golden triangle" of Southeast Asia via the Far East; the second runs from the Southwest Asia (Afghanistan, Pakistan) via Central Asia and Transcaucasia. There are new additions to the traditional drugs producers and traffickers - Vietnam and Cambodia. The People's Republic of China is also playing in recent years a growing role in the international drug-dealing, which has drawn into its orbit the Chinese diaspora in the Russian territory of the Far East and East Siberia. A certain portion of the drugs reaching Russia from Southeast Asia does not go via the Far East: they are at first brought to India, and thence to Central Asia and Transcaucasia, where the Russian borders can be penetrated easier than in the Far East.

The Central Asian and Transcaucasian states are increasingly involved in the illicit production and transportation of drugs. In those countries governmental agencies are incapable of keeping the situation under control, especially when the country in question is plagued by conflicts or suffers from internal instability, like Tajikistan. The situation is made still worse by the fact that drugs dealing is often used to achieve political aims, the money received are used in many cases to finance illegal political and military activities, first of all, arms purchases, funding of the armed groups or to provoke destabilization. According to the Russian experts, "drugs dealing in the CIS countries has very close links with the world of crime and organized criminal groups, on the one hand, and with separatist and extremist movements and their leaders, on the other" (5).

Tajikistan is the most typical example of deep connections between drug-dealing and political turmoil and disorder. This country is one of the Central Asian centers of the production of drugs and their transportation from Afghanistan. Grown there are opium poppy and Indian hemp - on plantations located in areas out of government control. As is only to be expected, the civil and clan conflict in this country and the resulting thousand-strong Tajik immigration to Afghanistan stimulated the radical growth of drugs dealing in and via Tajikistan.

According to the Tajikistan's Ministry of the Interior, about 200 tons of various narcotic substances was transported annually in the middle of the 1990s through the territory of Tajikistan, an amount equivalent to about 40 per cent of the whole volume of their illegal turnover in Russia. This said, law-enforcement bodies are able to apprehend but a small part of them.

Table 1

The amount of drugs apprehended by the units
of Tajikistan's Ministry of the Interior (kg)

Source: "Segodnya", 14 August 1996.

Officials of the Russian Federal Frontier Service believe that not more than 5-10 per cent of drugs shipped to Russia is detained at the Tajik-Afghan border (6). From Tajikistan, drugs flow to Kyrghyzstan, whose government is incapable of maintaining control over the transportation routes; besides, Kyrghyzstan has its own vast plantations of Indian hemp and opium poppy. Moreover, back in the Soviet period some farms in that country used to grow opium poppy for medicinal use and for many years about 16 per cent of the world's morphine was produced out of Kyrghyzstan-grown poppy. There is also the wild-growing ephedra plant in Kyrghyzstan, from which ephedrine is produced in clandestine laboratories. From Kyrghyzstan, narcotic substances are sent as semi- or end products to other countries of Central Asia, as well as to Russia and thence to Europe.

Turkmenistan, like Kyrghyzstan, is an important link in the drug-traffic route from Asia to Europe. Furthermore, there is a long-lasting tradition of drugs consumption in the country. The drugs used there are either indigenous or imported from territories in Afghanistan and Iran. A worrisome development is the dramatic increase in the area of opium-poppy plantations on irrigated Karakum land. Until recently Turkmenistan was merely a purveyor of narcotic semi-products, but at present local processing is on the increase.

Like all other countries of Central Asia, Kazakhstan is a large-scale base of drugs production, processing and transportation. It has extensive areas of wild-growing opium poppy (mostly in the south of the country); Indian hemp and ephedra are also to be found. The pharmaceutical factory located in the city of Shimkent is the largest facility in the CIS which produces narcotic substances. According to some information, illegal production of drugs is also carried on at this facility. The territory of Kazakhstan, similarly to that of the Russian Far East, is used for the transit of drugs from China. According to the Russia's Ministry of Internal Affairs, 93 per cent of the marihuana on the Russian drugs market comes from Kazakhstan, with 85 per cent of hashish and 73 per cent of opium either grown in Kazakhstan or delivered across its territory. The nearly 7,000-kilometre-long Kazakhstan-Russian border remains almost totally transparent, so that the drugs traffickers operating there have no serious problems.

One of the drug routes crosses the territory of Azerbaijan. The country has a several thousand kilometers long common border with Iran, which is a traditional producer of special types of drugs, first of all from opium and its derivatives. The 32nd session of the UN Subcommission on drugs control in the Near and Middle East (held in Baku in February 1997) acknowledged the recent success of the Republic's law-enforcement agencies in stanching to a considerable degree the flow of drugs across Azerbaijanian territory.

Active in the drug-dealing sphere are ethnic groups (including those hailing from the conflict zones) which often specialize in carrying out definitive functions or maintain control over certain areas. Criminal business, including the drugs and arms trade and hostage-taking, have become one of the main sources of income for some groups in Chechnya. The Russian special services are aware that drugs were carried on military transport planes based in Chechnya, e.g. the Grozny, Severny, Khankala is also lively drugs trafficking where the control of the central and Kalinovka airfields. There across the territory of Dagestan, Federal agencies is decreasing.

However, it is Moscow and St. Petersburg that continue to be Russia's drug centers. The headquarters of most of the drug-dealing groups are located in these cities, as are the clandestine laboratories which are engaged in refining and processing drugs or in producing synthetic narcotic substances. The main flows of drugs converge in the two cities, which are also the points from which the drugs continue their journey to some other areas of the country and to Europe. New drug centers and entire regions have emerged in Russia, in particular the Volga area, the south of Siberia and of the Far East (7).

In 1997 over 20,000 people were apprehended for drugs-trafficking offenses; according to expert estimates, this may be only one-tenth or one-twentieth of the entire number of pushers; the sales volume and prices registered no changes during that year (8). Up to 250 clandestine laboratories is annually uncovered in the country; these often make use of the latest achievements of chemistry. A gradual consolidation of the drug-dealing groupings is obviously taking place, with a tendency for greater specialization and cooperation. The drugs dealers manage to find their way into the power-holding organs and are able to neutralize the activities of the law-enforcement agencies. These groupings are keen on contacting the military so as to use the means commanded by the latter to their own advantage.

A Federal Government program of combined measures to counter drug abuse and illegal trafficking was adopted to cover the period of 1995-1997. However, not a single point of the program could be implemented, because out of the total of 85,4 bin roubles assigned for the purpose, not a single rouble was actually provided. To finance the new program for 1998-2000, 500 million denominated roubles are needed, but this program, too, hardly stands a chance of being funded. Russia is also stepping up bilateral and multilateral cooperation with other states, including those of the CIS, and with international organizations, in the struggle against drugs dealing, hoping to enlist assistance on the international scale. The three main routes by which the drugs reach Russia - the Far Eastern, Central Asia and Transcaucasian - are the same routes by which the drugs begin their journey to Europe and North America. The problem therefore has a wide international aspect.

The governments of the CIS member states have a far from uniform vision of collective cooperation to counter drugs dealing within the CIS. Uzbekistan, for one, refused to second Russia's proposal of March 1997 on granting the Bureau for the Coordination of Struggle Against Organized Crime (functioning under the Council of the CIS Ministers of Internal Affairs) the status of the subregional Interpol bureau for the CIS states.

Similarly to drug-dealing, terrorism is regularly gaining prominence in the range of non-traditional threats facing Russia. The worsening situation in this sphere is linked to a variety of causes, of which the foremost are the general social-economic crisis in the Russian Federation and the new independent states, interethnic conflicts, the political struggle among the groups seeking to redistribute control over property, the remarkable lessening of state control, the crisis that has gripped the army and the other power-structures, etc. The situation is most precarious in the south of Russia, especially in the North Caucasus. The "Chechen terrorism", which appeared in the middle of the 90s, was actually a component part of the conflict which proved to be of crucial importance for the country's political destiny.

The series of explosions that shook the railway stations of Russia, which are often ascribed to the Chechen terrorist organizations, helped to imprint on the people's minds a sense of their vulnerability, mistrust of the competence of the authorities and dread of terrorism. The total number of victims of the Pyatigorsk blast was 45, of whom two lost their lives. Certain Chechen commandos are bent upon making their presence constantly felt within the CIS space. It is not for nothing that Salman Raduyev claimed to be involved in an attempt on the life of Shevardnadze. One manifestation of criminal activities in Chechnya has been hostage taking, with the nationals of many countries listed among the dozens of hostages.

In Dagestan, social, interethnic and interclan contradictions find an outlet in all but daily skirmishes with exchange of fire, explosions and killings. Among the other terrorists' victims are sometimes high-rank Dagestan officials. One of them was Said Amirov, the Mayor of Makhach-Kala and Dagestan's Vice Premier, who survived eight attempts on his life which left him in a wheel-chair.

In this region, attacks on the checkpoints mounted by the security forces and the militia, with the capturing of servicemen, have become a routine practice. Regular cattle robberies suffered by the population are another destabilizing factor. The Ruling of the Government of the Russian Federation of October 11, 1997, pointed to the need of introducing extra measures in order to raise the efficiency of the Federal executive organs, and the executive organs of the members of the Russian Federation, in their efforts to combat crime and other abuses of the law in the North Caucasus region, and to protect the citizens' rights and liberties there (9).

Chechen terrorism is not contained by Russia's borders. Russian mass media often publicize materials accusing Turkey of supporting the Chechen separatists. Accusations of this kind were voiced also by some Russian official figures. Turkey could not conceal the fact that it harbored one of the main sources of support to the separatist forces, but the Turkish government kept assuring Moscow that Ankara did not support Chechen separatism and condemned terrorism in any form. However, a part of the Russian political circles still suspects that the support, which the Chechens were able to draw from Turkey's nongovernmental organizations and private persons, was countenanced by certain Turkish agencies and departments, if not by the authorities as a whole.

Organized crime, including that involving the countries of the Southern Tier, plays a significant role in the structure of non-traditional threats to the security of Russia. International organized crime is in many ways connected to large-scale smuggling.

One example of a conflict stemming from a non-traditional challenge is the "alcohol war" along the border between Russia and Georgia. For a long period of time this stretch of the border in the vicinity of the checkpoints Verkhny Lars and Nizhny Zaramag was used for the transit of huge amounts of illegal alcohol, which was subsequently delivered to clandestine distilleries in North Ossetia, whence their adulterated vodka found its way to numerous retailers in Russia. The strong barrier mounted by the Russian frontier guards to this traffic led to an exacerbation of relations between Georgia and Russia, which were brought back to normal only after a flurry of diplomatic activity and after the retirement of General Nikolaev, the Director of Frontier Service of the Russian Federation.

Recently Islamic extremism has also been identified as a non-traditional threat to security. It's true that certain Islamist movements are adhering to violent measures and to terrorism. However openly proclaimed struggle against this negative and dangerous trends may have a counterproductive results. The roots of Islamic extremism often lie in socio-economic sphere. Marginalization, poverty, crisis of traditional societies, absence of law and order produce fertile soil for extremism, which might be also encouraged from the outside, by Islamic movements and foundations, providing financial support and indoctrination. Dealing with this complicated phenomenon one should carefully avoid open accusations, labeling certain schools and trends within Islam, and rather pay main attention to the needs of the people, to improvement of their life.

The "troika" agreement adopted by Russia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan in May 1998 with a view of struggle against Islamic fundamentalism and extremism was an example of hasty and not well thought out attempt to subdue negative developments. Such document, despite all good intentions of the authors, can only arouse deep resignation of the Muslim population, which may perceive it as anti-Islamic, directed against their religion and tradition.

Сhallenges: mass migrations and refugees

There is no reason of regarding mass migration from the countries of Central Asia and Transcaucasia, on the whole, as a negative phenomenon, especially if account is taken of the decline of the population of the Russian Federation. A growing need is experienced in the influx of able-bodied people, and immigrants from the CIS countries are distinguished, as a rule, by great industrious-ness and absence of bad habits. At the same time one cannot ignore the painful and lengthy adaptation of the new arrivals, the prospects of excessive pressure on individual regions of the Russian Federation where the greatest concentration of migrants is possible, the refugees' frustration, growth of crime, rivalry with the local population and the appearance of additional channels for the import of arms and narcotics. The Federal Migration Program for 1998-2000 says: "The legislative base operative in the Russian Federation does not legally provide, in full, for the regulation of migration processes and protection of the migrants' rights" (10).

The mass outflow of specialists, mostly from a number of Central Asian states, causes additional phenomena of crisis in their economies and a growing social tension, which cannot but worry Russia. And, finally, the loss of Russians in the countries of the region spells the inevitable shrinking of Russia's sphere of influence, the further narrowing of the single informational and cultural space.

After the disintegration of the USSR, some 25 million Russians remained outside Russia. Their overwhelming majority was distributed as follows: 11.4 million are inhabitants of the Ukraine; 6.2 million, inhabitants of Kazakhstan; 1.4 million, inhabitants of Belarus.

To a certain extent scenarios of mass departure of Russians and Russian-speakers concern the countries of Central Asia and Transcaucasia, where the situation is taking shape unfavorably for their further residence. The emergence on the post-Soviet territory of these new independent states has led to a sharp change in the status of the given group of population.

The Russians' position in the republics was ensured, above all, by their occupying an important niche in the administrative and production sphere, where the local cadre could not compete with the migrants from Russia at the time when a massive migration was taking place to the republics of Central Asia and Transcaucasia. The equalization of socio-economic indexes throughout the territory of the Soviet Union with the help of accelerated industrial development of the national outlying areas, the construction of big enterprises, and the general fast modernization required an influx of highly skilled managers, industrialists, physicians, and teachers.

Table 2

Number of Russians in the republics
of Central Asia and the Transcaucasia, 1989

Source: Natsional'nyi sostav naseleniia SSSR: Po dannym Vsesoiuznoi perepisi naseleniia 1989 g. (National composition of the population of the USSR: Data of the 1989 census) (Moscow: Financy i Statistika, 1991).

The independence of the former Soviet republics of the region was accompanied by searches for self-identification, within which the national leaders appealed to the traditional values, thereby isolating, willy-nilly, the Russian population. The revival of ethnicity, at the initial stage at any rate, was associated with independent development and served to replace the idea of a national state with the reality of a state of the "title nation". The hastily adopted laws on the national language and citizenship without account taken of the polyethnic composition of these states, hit especially hard citizens of other than aboriginal nationality, who in this new situation no longer saw a prosperous future for themselves and their children.

Moreover, within the framework of independent states one can ever more distinctly see the attempts of the ruling groupings of the titular nation to acquire leading positions in the division of property and in the course of privatization to lay their hands on the main levers of power and profit.

The major motive for the Russians' mass departure, besides ethnic discomfort, are conflicts in some of the Central Asian states. Direct threat to personal security and the prospect of loss of property and the means of subsistence ousted masses of refugees beyond the borders of the countries where they had lived for many years, compelling them to seek shelter in Russia. The exodus of the Russians was also caused by the demographic factor. Since 1959 the population of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenia has almost trebled, and of Kyrghyzia has increased almost 2.2 times (11).

The dynamics of migration from the Central Asian states to Russia since the mid-1970s, as well as analysis of the general situation in these states make many researchers come to the conclusion that the process of outflow of non-native population from Central Asia, Russians first of all, is irreversible. By the end of 1996, 2.4 million people had emigrated to Russia, of whom almost 70 per cent from Central Asian (12)

Migrants to the Russian Federation from Central Asia in 1996

Source: Chislennost' i migratziya naseleniya Rossiyskoi Federatzii v 1996 g./Numerical strength and migration of the population of the Russian Federation in 1996/, Moscow: Goskomstat, 1997, p. 33, 42.

Each of the Central Asian countries has its own peculiarities influencing the emigration of Russians. The appearance of nationalistic and Islamic parties and movements on the political arena of Tajikistan on the eve of the civil war had sharply strained interethnic relations. According to the Federal Migration Service of Russia, out of the 388,000 Slavs living in Tajikistan in 1989 a total of 300,000 left the country by the end of April 1993 (13). This has complicated to a certain extent the situation in the public health services, education and industry, although the sharp decline of production has been the inevitable outcome of the war and persisting instability. The outflow of the population not belonging to the "title nation", as well as a considerable proportion of the Tajik intelligentsia nurtured on Russian culture, has deprived the country of an important stabilizing factor of special significance in the fragmented Tajik society, with its regional, rather than national, self-identification and aggravation of relations with the local Uzbeks making up about 25 per cent of the population.

In Turkmenistan Russian inhabitants were few; nevertheless, owing to their being employed in the oil-and-gas industry they provided 95 per cent of the republic's budget. Their attempts to leave Turkmenistan are mostly due to the hard socio-economic conditions. The rationing system, shortage of foodstuffs, low wages and lack of contacts with the countryside, where they could obtain additional food, put the Russians in a hard and unequal with the Turkmen position. The rigid authoritarian regime prevents in every way the departure of Russian specialists still dominating in high technology branches. There have been introduced a ban on the sale of dwellings and restrictions on the exportation of property.

In Uzbekistan, despite the political stability maintained by President Karimov, emigration of the Russian population has increased. From August 1992 to April 1995, 102,666 persons left the country for Russia, which made up 13.1 per cent of the total number of forced resettlers and refugees in Russia during that period (14).

In the Uzbek society, most Islamized and traditional in Central Asia and comparatively ethnically homogeneous, Russians felt more acutely than in other countries of the region that they were aliens after the independence. One of the leading factors of their departure from the country has been their not knowing the Uzbek language. The government of Uzbekistan, while helping ethnic Uzbeks' promotion to the key posts, is at the same time trying to retain Russian specialists. It can be expected that an active growth of the local skilled personnel and the policy of training specialists abroad will become an additional factor of their emigration.

The main reasons of the Russians' exodus from Kyrghyzstan little differed from those common for Central Asia - the introduction of the Kyrghyz language as the only official language; the pressure on the labor market on the part of the growing native population, the active ejection of rural inhabitants into towns and their rapid and dangerous marginalization. Important factors were also the anti-Russian actions of Kyrghyz young people in 1991, which did not receive a proper rebuff from the government. A negative demonstrative effect was contained in the bloody conflict in Osh between Kyrghyz and Uzbeks, which showed the administration's inability to prevent destabilization of the situation and to ensure security of the citizens. From 1989 to 1993, the country was left by a total of over 460,000 people: Russians, Tatars, Uzbeks, Kazakhs, and Tajiks. In 1993 alone, from 100,000 to 120,000 Russian-speakers emigrated from the republic (15).

The exodus of the non-native population, Slavic above all, in 1993 almost led to a disaster in the economy. The ultra-nationalistic moods of the first years of independence gradually vanished. The government took a number of measures to end the forced introduction of the Kyrghyz language, and opened a Slavic University, the first one in Central Asia. Although a number of adopted measures were obviously belated, they nevertheless helped to decrease emigration from Kyrghyzstan.

Kazakhstan holds a special place in the system of Russian geopolitical interests in the CIS. It has the longest border with Russia (7,000 km.) and a largest Russian population. In 1989 Kazakhs made up a minority in this state - 39.7 per cent. Along with the disperse distribution of the Russian population in Kazakhstan, there is, in contrast to the other Central Asian states, also its compact settlement: the territories of the present northern, northeastern regions, where Russians constituted the overwhelming majority. They include: Severo-Kazakhstanskaya, Kustanaiskaya, Kokchetavskaya, Akmolinskaya, Pavlodarskaya, Karagandinskaya, Semipalatinskaya, Vostochno-Kazakhstanskaya oblasts (regions) and a number of big cities like Alma-Ata, Taldy-Kurgan, etc.

In Kazakhstan Russians, as distinct from other countries of the region, did not feel they were newcomers. This was due to compact settlement and historical contacts with the Russian regions; rapid assimilation by a considerable number of Kazakhs of Russian culture; little developed Islamic traditions and so on.

In this connection precisely Russians in Kazakhstan most acutely felt the growing pressure after the collapse of the USSR. It found its expression in the Constitution and the legislation of the Republic of Kazakhstan, in the practical politics of its leaders, who were compelled to take into account the nationalistic approaches especially characteristic of the inhabitants of the southern areas. Hence the recognition of the Kazakh language alone as official (by the time of disintegration of the USSR only one per cent of the Russian-speaking population knew it), the proclamation of Kazakhstan as the state of "self-determined Kazakh nation", etc. To Kazakhstan the changing of the ethnic composition of the republic in favor of the "title nation" became one of paramount importance. With it the Kazakhstan leadership associated the prospect of existence of the Republic of Kazakhstan as a unitary state, fearing the rise of separatist sentiments in the regions populated by Russians. The faster natural growth of Kazakhs and the Russian emigration resulted in Kazakhs making up in 1994 already 44.3 per cent and the proportion of Russians having declined down to 35.8 per cent (16), "Kazakhization" of the Russian regions is proceeding apace, including Kazakhs' appointment to administrative and executive posts, and the renaming of towns with old Russian names: Petropavlovsk" Kzylzhar; Guryev - Aktau. Indicating the Kazakh authorities' active "attack" on the territories with a compact Russian population, A.A.Yazkova, the Russian researcher, wrote: "...recent years witnessed an active process of repatriation of ethnic Kazakhs from Mongolia and China, who are being settled precisely in the northern regions, and are provided with housing vacated by Russians or Germans emigrating in large quotas (200,000 annually) to the Federal Republic of Germany or Russia" (17).

Table 4

Immigration of Kazakhs to Kazakhstan (1991-94)

Source: Analiz sotsial'no-ekonomicheskoi i politicheskoi obstanovki v respublike Kazakhstan v 1994 godu. Informatsionno-analiticheskii biulleten', No. 7 (Moscow, Federal'naia migratsionnaia sluzhba RF, 1995), p. 55.

As regards Russia's security, destabilization of the situation in Kazakhstan would be a very grave challenge. "The internal de-stabilization of Kazakhstan is likely to entail interethnic conflicts between ethnic Kazakhs and Russians and would pose a severe political, security and economic challenge to the Russian government. It would have few choices other than intervene, as both a measure to protect expatriate Russians and to extinguish a potentially major regional conflict at its doorstep, in lands still considered by many Russians to be traditionally Russian" (18).

Even if the interethnic conflict in Kazakhstan does not reach a crisis stage, nevertheless the Russians' exodus from this republic will likewise bring about undesirable consequences for Russia. Russians in Kazakhstan, owing to their numerical strength and specificity of distribution, constitute an important element of inter-state relations, increase interdependence between Kazakhstan and Russia and ensure Kazakhstan's special place in the system of Russian priorities in the Commonwealth of Independent States. The Federal Migration Program envisages co-ordinating "the questions of realization of economic, credit-and-finance , and foreign policies as regards the states -former republics of the USSR with the protection of rights and interests of the compatriots living in these states"(19).

As distinct from the republics of Central Asia, the migration stream from Transcaucasia to Russia is characterized by a much lower percentage of Russians and an appreciable share of representatives of local nationalities, which in some cases creates additional problems for the Russian Federation (and not only for it).

Table 5

Migrants to the Russian Federation from Transcaucasia in 1996

Source: Chislennost' i migratziya naseleniya Rossiyskoi Federatzii v 1996 g. Moscow: Finansi i Stalistika, 1997, p. 33, 42.

Relatively low figures of the Russian migrants can be explained by the fact that on the whole in the republics of this region their number in absolute figures is much less than in Central Asia. The ratio of Russians compared with the local population, according to the 1989 census, did not exceed an average of five per cent. Now the region is being left not only by recent migrants but also by Russian old residents who had come there 100 or 150 years ago. The latter move in the main to the southern agricultural areas of Russia. The causes of departure are similar to those which exist in Central Asia - the deteriorating socio-economic situation, armed conflicts, and nationalistic moods. At the same time these republics have a large number of internal refugees from the conflict zones, which creates additional pressure.

In Azerbaijan, as compared with other Transcaucasian republics, more clearly expressed are such factors as the dependence of career on the knowledge of the aboriginal language (20).

The closure of Russian schools and departments at higher educational establishments made many Russians or members of mixed families send their children to study in Russia, which in the final count impels them to emigration. The conflict around Nagorny Karabakh has become a major stimulus to emigration, arousing in Russians apprehensions for their safety and adding the Azeri refugees to the already troubled scene.

Similar reasons for Russians' emigration are to be observed in Armenia as well. An additional factor is Armenia's blockade: the absence of fuel, electricity, foodstuffs, and unemployment. According to the 1995-96 data, a little more than 15,000 Russians have remained in Armenia (21).

In Georgia the migration to Russia had both socio-economic reasons and the problems of security that arose and were sharply aggravated in connection with the Georgian-Abkhazian conflict. Many Russians of whom 74,000 lived in Abkhazia had to move to Russia. In the words of A.Yakovenko, Counsellor of the Embassy of the Russian Federation in Georgia, "as regards the official policy, everything is all right here. The law of citizenship adopted in Georgia is in line with the international standards, as distinct, for example, from the laws of the Baltic countries"(22). At the same time the growing nationalistic sentiments at the time of Zviad Gamsakhurdiya had done a serious damage to interethnic relations in the country. At the everyday-life level, cases of intolerance are frequent enough, and the local authorities cannot always ensure effectuation of the existing laws. The result was that some 150,000 Russians arrived in Russia from Georgia in 1991-93.

On the whole, the outflow of Russians from Transcaucasia does not have such a destabilizing effect on the economy as in a number of Central Asian republics. For Russia the scope of Russians' migration from this region is practically insignificant. A more serious problem for it can be migration (often illegal) of the local ethnic groups and nations. Among negative trends connected with it one can name a rise of xenophobia in Russia. On the one hand, it is caused by the fact that these immigrants, often more industrious and active, tend to occupy certain economic niches, thus competing with the local Russians. On the other hand, in big cities their involvement in criminal activities is getting pronounced. The authorities are often taking advantage of it making "Caucasians" a sort of scapegoats.

Many displaced persons and refugees practically from all post-Soviet conflict zones came to the North Caucasus, mainly to Rostov, Krasnodar and Stavropol regions. The main part of the forced migrants has moved from Chechnya. In 1995 in Rostov region, for example, they made up over 50 per cent of the total of refugees and resettlers. Russian newcomers make up over 70 per sent of the migrants in the North Caucasus; they are followed by people of local nations from Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia. The number of Armenians going to Russia exceeds the number of Russians leaving the Republic of Armenia (23).

An increasingly important immigration problem is posed by transit through Russia of illegal immigrants to European countries. This caused, for instance, tension in relations between Russia and Poland, where illegal immigrants - Kurds, Iranians, etc. -traveled across Russian territory. Kurds' route also lies across Lithuania to Sweden. The Kurd question also overshadowed Russia's relations with Turkey, which accuses the Russian Federation of training Kurds in special camps.

Risks: degradation of the environment

The problems raised by the deterioration of the environment in Central Asia and Transcaucasia are acquiring an ever more acute character, as the states of these regions have not the means and resources for a radical improvement of the situation. At the same time, the class of problems examined here bears but an indirect and implied relation to Russia's security. The shortage of drinking water, the discharge of poisoning substances, radiation pollution, etc., really constitute a whole series of "non-traditional" risks. However, such risks, listed, by the way, in the "Concept of National Security of the Russian Federation", are, first and foremost, negative by-effects of economic activity inside Russia itself. The similar processes in Central Asia and Transcaucasia until now have not reached a magnitude where Russia could become an injured party (Russia can be more seriously affected by ecological degradation in the border areas with the new independent states, including seas). A brief consideration of the elements of ecological degradation in the given section is motivated both by an assumed possibility of their potential negative influence on the ecological situation in the Russian Federation, and by the prospect of a destabilizing influence on the situation in the states of Central Asia and Transcaucasia.

The non-traditional risks in the Caspian and Black Seas may be said to include: poaching and violation of fishing rules (both by citizens of foreign states, often fishing illegally in Russian territorial waters, and Russian poachers); pollution through economic activities of both littoral states and Russian industrialists; decline of fish resources as the result of environmental degradation; organized crime in the fishing sphere (above all, uncontrolled catching by Russian and non-Russian ships of fish and sea products with their subsequent sale bypassing the legal channels), etc.

Russia is trying to guarantee maximum of ecological security to the Caspian sea which calls for joint efforts of the five Caspian states to preserve its biological resources, the stock of sturgeons in particular. According to the available data, there is a sharp decrease in the number of sturgeons fit for commercial use. Thus, while in 1970 530,000 tons of fish were caught, in 1992-96 the total ranged from 190,000 tons to 250,000 tons, with the weight of the sturgeon caught disastrously declining (from 23,000 tons in 1970 to 11,000-6,000 tons in, 1992-96). "The wholesale value of 1 ton of Black Caviar depends on the type of sturgeon, in the world market from US $ 600,000, and the oil US $ 80 to 110" (24).

The unique Caspian ecosystem is being destroyed by the discharge of sewage and polluta'its: in 1996 their discharge into the Caspian Sea amounted to 1993 million cubic meters (25).

The elevation of the level of the Caspian Sea also calls for joint effort on the part of the Caspian littoral states. Even now, more than 650 thousand hectares of land on the territory of Kazakhstan adjoining the Caspian has been flooded. "The projected rise of the sea to the -25 metre mark (the Caspian is situated below sea level) will flood three million hectares of pasture, towns and cities, and industrial complexes"(26). In Azerbaijan, seven cities and 35 settlements with a population of about 700 thousand are in jeopardy. Direct losses from the elevation of water level in the Caspian are estimated to reach 2 billion dollars (27). In the process, the flood water carries wastes dangerous for human life and activity.

There are fears in Russia that future oil production in the Caspian basis can harm fragile ecological balance in the Caspian Sea, especially if the oil production is dominated by local oligarchies without democratization of their regimes. In the view of German experts, the region could not cope with a new ecological disaster, given inevitable danger of continuing rising of the water level by a possible fourteen centimeters through the year 2010 or 2020 and deterioration of rusting old drill structures. "It still has no answer to the drying up and poisoning of the Aral Sea due to the cotton mono-culture of its two most important tributaries, the Amur-Darja and the Syr-Darja, nor for the area of Semipalatinsk, a former nuclear testing ground of the Soviet Union, should be brought under control"(28).

However, any successful efforts to manage the acute environmental emerging in the Caspian could be realized only if a legal status of the Caspian sea is developed and approved by all littoral states. Russia's vision of this status till the very beginning of 1998 was frequently interpreted as the desire to hamper the activities of the littoral new independent states to produce Caspian oil in cooperation with foreign companies. Without denying the existence in the Russian establishment of such forces as want to use Caspian oil as an instrument for influencing the other NIS and obtaining maximum advantages for Russia itself, it should be noted that the concern for the future of the Caspian Sea is well founded. As is admitted by Innokenty Nalyotov, Commander of the Naval Forces of the FFS of the Russian Federation, so far the FBGS of Russia: "has to be guided by the principle that today national jurisdiction of each of the Caspian states is limited to the coastline. Consequently, measures to prevent poaching, smuggling of drugs and arms on the sea can be taken only with regard to our own ships and citizens"(29).

One of the most painful ecological problems in the regions under consideration is a lack of pure drinking water. The states, experiencing heavy transition period in economy, are compelled to make do with old equipment for purifying water, which is not capable to get rid of all pollution and to improve quality. For example, in Armenia the loss of drinking water resulting from unusable pipes reach up to 28 per cent, and that of water used for irrigation purposes - up to 46 per cent. Out of 210 water-pumping stations carrying out the biological cleaning of water, only 18 may be consider fit for use (30).

An even more difficult situation in this respect has developed in Tajikistan, where epidemics of typhus have become regular. The main reason for this is the fact that the government, not having sufficient means for purifying water, was compelled to desist from attempts at its chlorination. Both children and adults, who were not accustomed to observing elementary rules of boiling water, at once fell victim to this measure. The worn-out equipment at water-pumping stations and old piping also help make the water supplied to individual homes actually unsuitable.

In Kazakhstan, the Ministry of Public Health has even carried out special research on the influence of the quality of water on the morbidity of the population. According to its data, every fourth person in Kazakhstan suffered a respiratory disease due to the consumption of poor-quality drinking water.

For Kazakhstan, the Aral Sea has become the most painful environmental problem: the drying-up of the Aral Sea, the salinization of the soil, the emergence of a dead zone, which in addition had been poisoned by pesticides in the past. Life expectancy in the regions adjoining the Aral Sea, where about 10 per cent of the population of Kazakhstan lives, at present reaches no more than 60 years. Although the ecological disaster in the Aral zone is one of the most serious ecological catastrophes in the world and has drawn international attention, nevertheless the measures being taken have until now brought no improvements.

Radioactive waste disposal is also fraught with a high degree of risk. For example, in Kyrghyzstan there are such disposal sites near the border with Uzbekistan. Besides the fact that they represent a menace to the health of the population of Kyrgyzstan, the Uzbek experts have repeatedly expressed fears that in spring, during the flooding, the overflowing waters can bring these wastes to Uzbekistan. The dangerous radiation conditions have also developed in Kazakhstan in the zone of the former nuclear test site near Semipalatinsk.

Presently, in view of the decreasing industrial output in Central Asia and the Transcaucasus, the closure of a number of factories, the emissions of poisoning substances into the atmosphere have decreased; however, this phenomenon is temporary and has in no way been dictated by successful actions of ecological ministries.

The particularity of ecological risks is that not only are expensive measures required to curb them, but also the introduction of correctives to the strategy of economic activity, the abandonment of many harmful industries or habitual ways of farming based on the use of plenty of pesticides, the production of new kinds of energy raw material, which basically represents one of the most serious global problems. Taking into account the obvious inability of post-Soviet countries to check environmental degradation, one may reach a conclusion that in the foreseeable future an increase of the role and specific weight of non-traditional risks of this type is inevitable.

Conclusions

Analysis of the main nontraditional threats Russia encounters in Central Asia and Transcaucasia provides a lot of evidence of their dangerous nature at the present time and also of their destructive potential for the future. In circumstances when traditional threats are loosing some of their importance, these new challenges might become much more serious destabilizing factors. To counter both direct and indirect threats to Russia's security requires taking measures at the national level, within the CIS, and the regional and international levels.

However not all threats mentioned above deserve immediate Russia's attention. Among non-traditional threats analyzed in this chapter only drug-dealing and terrorism, originating or coming from "the Southern Tier", may have a direct bearing on Russia's national security. As for the others, defined here as challenges and risks, their possible negative effect is minimal. While being serious threats for the Southern Tier countries themselves, they cannot be treated as such by the Russian Federation. An obvious strengthening of centrifugal trends within the CIS will inevitably subdue an importance of negative domestic developments in the Southern Tier countries for Russia. Severance of economic, cultural, and, to a certain extent, political ties (to a different degree in every particular case and from country to country) contributes to making the former Soviet republics, Russia included, less interdependent.

Russia's security will hardly be affected either by environmental degradation in Central Asia and Transcaucasia or by forced migration from these countries. This does not mean that Russia can simply ignore negative impulses coming from "the Southern Tier", but it can obviously reconcile itself .to the situation, at least for the time being.

Besides, there are serious limitations to even humble efforts of the Russian government (if any) to check the threats and risks of non-traditional type. Among them, first and foremost, the present economic crisis which might exclude the very opportunity of resorting to active and expensive counter measures. The decision-making process, moreover, remains incoherent and protracted. It is unclear who will coordinate the effectuation of the Conception of National Security of the Russian Federation.

Even more problematical is coordination of efforts with the states of Central Asia and Transcaucasia to contain the challenges and threats. As it is known, they often perceive Russia's respective proposals as an attempt of encroachment on their national sovereignty. Even the law-enforcing departments not always find a common language despite the generally recognized danger of terrorism and drug trafficking. At the same time, the states of the region themselves often have no means of solving the arising problems single-handedly.

The regional level furnishes examples of useful cooperation but in some states of the region there are forces (not always controlled by the government) which follow a destructive line, giving support to the terrorists, Islamic extremists, which complicates the attempts to jointly counteract threats to Russia's security.

On the whole, one can hardly expect a breakthrough in Russia's long-term security policy with regard to the republics of the former USSR, including Central Asia and Transcaucasia, where its approaches are distinguished by more or less effective restrain of traditional threats, while its reaction to non-traditional ones is often belated, impulsive and contradictory.

Notes:

(1) Narkobiznes na iuge Rossii: politicheskie aspecty, gennady Chuirin (ed.) (Dmg dealing in the South of Russia: Political Aspects), (Moscow: Insti-tut vostokovedeniya RAN, 1997), p. 6.

(2) Narkobiznes: novaia ugroza Rossii s Vostoka, Gennady Chufrin (ed.) (Drug dealing: New threat to Russia from the East), (Moscow: Institut vostokovedeniya RAN, 1996), p. 4.

(3) "Krasnaya zvezda", June 5, 1997.

(4) "Nezavisimaya gazeta - Krug zhizni", No. 3, March 1998, p. 1.

(5) Narkobiznes: novaya ugroza Rossii s Vostoka, p. 59.

(6) "Nezavisimaya gazeta - Krug zhizni." No. 3, March 1998, p. 1.

(7) See: Narkobiznes na yuge Rossii: politicheskiye aspekty, pp. 6-7.

(8) "Izvestiya", January 13, 1998.

(9) "Rossiiskaya gazeta", October 21, 1997.

(10) "Rossiiskaya gazeta", November 27, 1997.

(11) Zh. Zaionchkovskaia, Istoricheskie komi migratsionnoi situatsii v Srednei Azii: Migratsiia russkoiazychnogo naseleniia iz Tsentral'noi Azii: prichiny, posledstviia, perspectivy (Historical roots of the migration situation in Central Asia: Migration of Russian speaking population from Central Asia: causes, consequences, perspectives) (Moscow: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1996), p. 47.

(12) Doklad о razvitii chelovecheskogo potentsiala v Rossiiskoi Federatsii. God 1997 /Report on the Development of Human Potential in the Russian Federation. The Year of 1997./ Ed. Professor Yu.Fyodorov. Moscow: Inturreklama Design, 1997, p. 35.

(13) "Nezavisimaya gazeta" April 29, 1993.

(14) V.A. Tishkov, Managing Editor, Migratsii i novye diaspory v post-sovetskikh gosudarstvakh (Moscow: Institut etnologii i antropologii RAN, 1996), p. 37.

(15) I.A. Subbotina, Russkaia diaspora: chislennost, rasselenie, migratsiia. Russkie v novom zarubezh'e. Kyrgyzia (The Russian diaspora: Numbers, distribution, and migration. Russians in the new foreign countries. Kyrgyzia) ( Moscow: Institut etnologii i antropologii RAN, 1995), pp. 64-65.

(16) Analiz sotsial'no-ekonomicheskoi i politicheskoi obstanovki v respub-like Kazakhstan v 1994 godu. Informatsiomio-analiticheskii biulleten' No.7 (Analysis of the socio-economic and political situation in the Republic of Kazakhstan in 1994, Information and Analytical Bulletin No. 7) (Moscow: Fed-eral'naia migratsionnaia sluzhba RF, 1995), p. 54.

(17) A.A. lazkova, Rossiiskaia diaspora v stranakh novogo zarubezh'ia: Kazakhstan, Latviia, Gruziia. Problemy i vozmozhnye puti ikh resheniia (The Russian diaspora in the new foreign countries: Kazakhstan, Latvia, Georgia: Problems and possible solutions) (Moscow: Institut mezhdunarodnykh eko-nomicheskikh i politicheskikh issledovanii RAN, 1996), pp. 11-12.

(18) Eugene B. Rumer, "Russia and Central Asia After the Soviet Collapse," in Jed C. Snyder, ed.. After Empire: The Emerging Geopolitics of Central Asia (Ft. McNair, Washington, D.C.: National Defense University Press, 1995), p. 59.

(19) "Rossiiskaya gazeta", November 27, 1997.

(20) V.A. Tishkov, ed., Migratsii i novye diaspory v postsovetskikh gosu-darstvakh (Migrations and new diasporas in the post-Soviet states) (Moscow: Institut etnologii i antropologii RAN, 1996), p. 168.

(21) V.A. Tishkov, ed., Migratsii i novye diaspory v postsovetskikh gosudarstvakh (Migrations and new diasporas in the post-Soviet states) (Moscow: Institut etnologii i antropologii RAN, 1996), p. 165.

(22) A. V. lakovenko, Counselor of the Embassy of the Russian Federation in Georgia, quoted in Gruziia. Sobytiia. Liudi (Georgia. Events. People), No. 8 (1994).

(23) Tishkov, Migratsii i novye diaspory v postsovetskikh gosudarstvakh (Migrations and new diasporas in the post-Soviet states), p. 25.

(24) Ch. Blandy , The Caspian: A Catastrophe in the Making: The Destruction of a Unique Ecosystem (Camberley, U.K.: Conflict Studies Research Center, Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, September 1997), pp. 10, 16.

(25) 0 sostoyanii okruzhayutshei sredy v Rossiiskoi Federatsii v 1996 g. (On the State of Environment in the Russian Federation in 1996), (Moscow: Rosgidromet, 1997), p. 7.

(26) The Shrinking State: Governance and Human Development in Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States, A UNDP Regional Report (New York: United Nations Development Program, July 1997), p. 121.

(27) Ibid.

(28) Zukunftregion: Kaspisches Meer. Position papier der-SPD-Bundestagsfraction. Bonn, Juni 1998, s. 26-27.

(29) "Nezavisimaya gazeta", June 5, 1997.

(30) UNDP, The Shrinking State, p. 120.

Russian Center for Strategic Research and International Studies. M., 1999