Many western analysts have described the post-Soviet tussle for Caspain and Central Asian energy reserves as the new “Great Game, except this time around, Russia is facing the U.s. rather than the British empire.

We have, in the past year, entered an entirely new dynamic in Eastern Mediterranean and South-East European strategic affairs. We are in a period and a region in which Russia, not the West, is taking the key initiatives and has much of the advantage.

On December 14, 2009, an inauguration took place that deserves more attention than it received because it marks an economic power shift to the benefit of three Central Asian countries and China and to the detriment of Russia.

Most foreign investors have been focused on Central Asia’s vast hydrocarbon resources and the extractive industries of energy and Minerals. But water is an issue of rising concern throughout the region as after years of soviet mismanagement geopolitical tensions are running high.