In October 2013, around 200 protestors from the rural settlement Maidan in Kyrgyzstan clashed violently with the representatives of the exploration company as they brought in the first excavator to construct the mining infrastructure for the 'Shambesai' gold deposit. This paper is an attempt to understand the processes and practices that have led to this escalation and that continue to sustain Maidan's rejection of the gold mine to date. Motivated by state and corporate assertions that attribute such actions primarily to material interests, we engage this resistance to gold extractivism in sociomaterial terms trying to understand more deeply the dynamics of ordinary citizens' activism. Based on multi-stage interdisciplinary research, we trace and reconstruct the socionatural conditions and practices that have culminated in Maidan's decade-long struggle to unmake gold as a resource on their territory. Focusing on resource materialities, their valuations and governance, we present an historico-geographical analysis of making and unmaking of a resource frontier. Against the backdrop of the extractive order that has prevailed in Kyrgyzstan over the last three decades, we understand Maidan's struggle to be a form of situated institutional experimentation for shaping meaningful and just more-than-human socionatures.
Central Asia is highly vulnerable to climate change and its temperature is rising faster than the global average. This article assesses the extent to which the academic community engaged with climate change in Central Asia between 1991 and 2021.
Paper long abstract:
Central Asia is highly vulnerable to climate change and its temperature is rising faster than the global average, thus posing various risks to the region. This article assesses the extent to which the academic community engaged with climate change in Central Asia between 1991 and 2021. The systematic review method with respect to academic and grey literature is used. The article finds that climate change has been neglected in the field of Central Asia area studies. The very same scholars who have been most active in the securitisation of Central Asia have ignored the severe security threats that climate change poses to the region. The article contributes to the field of Central Asian studies by drawing attention to severe knowledge gaps that hinder the countries from adapting to climate change. It concludes with six policy and research-related recommendations.
The article explores the tailing dump from uranium production that was created back in the 1950-1960th during the USSR era. It is located on a mountainside near the Mailuu-Suu River, Kyrgyzstan at a distance of about 100 m from the riverbed.
Paper long abstract:
The article explores the tailing dump from uranium production that was created back in the 1950-1960th during the USSR era. It is located on a mountainside near the Mailuu-Suu River, Kyrgyzstan at a distance of about 100 m from the riverbed. It was closed by a meter-thick rock. The disposal capacity was approximately 100000 m3 with a uranium content of 1000 m3/kg.
Over time, a constant source of water appeared in the body of the burial at a height of 2/3 from the base, which washes the tails. Uranium contained in the burial, along with water, falls into the riverbed by seepage. This area is densely populated, and the study is needed to explore risks to the health of the population because they use the river water for household.
The purpose of the study is to determine the quantitative indicator of the flow of dissolved uranium, which, together with groundwater falls into the riverbed. Calculation of water filtration in the rock mass along with polluting uranium dissolved in this water was performed using the HYDRUS-ID program.
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