DUSHANBE, January 19, 2009, Asia-Plus  -- Political elites of the post-Soviet republics are gradually stepping aside from Russia as integration center, Suhrob Sharipov, director of the Tajik Center for Strategic Center, remarked at an international conference in Dushanbe on Saturday.

A two-day conference entitled “Social Specificity of Political Culture in Central Asia”, staged by the Center for Strategic Studies in cooperation with Russia’s Center for Strategic and Political Studies and the Rose Luxemburg Foundation (Germany), was held in the Tajik capital on January 16-17.

On the dynamics of formation of a news political culture in a number of the post-Soviet republics, including Central Asia’s states, Sharipov noted that development of the dynamics could be divided into three stages.   

“The first stage could be called inert (inactive); it is characterized by continuation of Soviet traditions on understanding of fraternal solidarity among states within the post-Soviet area,” said Sharipov, “After collapse of the Soviet Union, the post-Soviet republics except the Baltic nations have been more or less attached by the Kremlin as the single center; they have done that trough inertia.”

The second stage includes transformation processes, when the post-Soviet republics tried to find a new place in the system of international relations and thereby disabusing themselves of illusions.  “The point is that it was very difficult to restore the Union because Russia was engaged in solving it own problems and it had no time for other countries; as a result of this, they remained disregarded,” Tajik pundit said.

The third stage of development of the dynamics of formation of a new political culture includes formation by political elites of the post-Soviet republics of new independent foreign policy doctrines.  This has led to Georgia’s present attitude to Russia.  “There are no any serious pro-Russian political forces in Georgia now, you know,” Sharipov said, noting that political elites of other CIS states were also moving to that.

The fact that political elites of the CIS states are stepping aside from Russia as integration center is not “a positive fact,” Sharipov stressed.

On the formation of the new political culture in Tajikistan, the expert said that it was taking place without mentioned stages.  “Our foreign policy is fundamental both in relations with the CIS states and in relations with countries of Europe, America and Arab world, which we are opening for ourselves all over again,” he said, noting that political culture is directly connected with political awareness.

“As our elite becomes more educated and its world outlook becomes wider, it stops considering Russia as attractive center of political integration,” Sharipov said.