Valdai Club

2016

The Middle East: An Arena of Confrontation or Collective Action?

Ivan Timofeev

Programme Director of the Valdai Discussion Club, Director General of the Russian International Affairs Council, Associate Professor at MGIMO MFA of Russia

As old ties in the region are being broken and new relations emerge, the crisis of statehood has entered the stage of the de facto disintegration of states, a ‘war of all against all’, the shaping of new political and military realities, and the possible creation of new states on the ruins of the Sykes-Picot system, whose hundredth anniversary will be marked this year. The scourge of radical Islamism is spreading across the world, affecting Europe and Russia as well as many other countries which have become the subject of terrorist attacks. The objective of this thematic strand is to research the fundamental dynamics of developments in the region, the impact of the Middle East crisis on Russia and Eurasia, to identify the most probable scenarios, as well as to outline potential solutions. The factors shaping Russia’s approach to regional crises and challenges will be an important part of this programme.

Reports

Report: Countering the Threat of the Globalization of Middle Eastern Terrorism. A Perspective from Russia and Israel

Terror began spreading internationally in the late 1960s and early 1970s through the actions of secular ideological and separatist terrorist organizations. In the late 1980s, many radical Islamist organizations pledged their allegiance to a new force – al-Qaeda, one of the largest ultraradical international terrorist organizations of the Wahhabi branch of Islam. Salafi jihadist terrorism fully positioned itself in the international arena with the terrorist attacks of 2001 in the United States.

Tatiana Karasova, Zvi Magen, Yoram Schweitzer

Report: Middle East Instability and the Decline of the Westphalian System

The events in the Middle East put a number of questions regarding the existing political system of the world.

Marina Lebedeva, Raffaele Marchetti

Report: Crucial Players or Insufficient Powers? The USA, Russia and the EU in the Middle East

The Valdai Club report's purpose is to expose interests of the three players in the Middle East as well as alteration in their strategies in the rapidly changing regional landscape.

Valdai Papers

Global Energy and the Political Dynamics in the Middle East

Crude oil returns as the key commodity on the global oil markets and, therefore, a closer look is needed to establish what the main challenges and opportunities are.

Slawomir Raszewski

Russian Islam and the Situation in the Middle East

The 48th issue of the Valdai Papers is devoted to Russian Islam in the context of the situation in the Middle East.

Akhmet Yarlykapov

The Iranian Deal: Opportunities and Obstacles for Russian-US Cooperation

International agreement on the Iranian nuclear issue, signed in summer of 2015 (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action - JCPOA), has become a turning point in efforts to strengthen the nuclear non-proliferation regime. However, approaches to its implementation are still the subject of controversy between the parties.

Richard Weitz, Andrey Baklitskiy

Middle East: The Main trends

In late February, in Moscow, the Valdai Discussion Club hosted the 5th meeting of the Valdai Middle East dialogue, «The Middle East: From Violence to Security». This paper gives the summary of the discussions and conclusions reached by its participants.

Andrey Skriba, Dmitry Novikov