Entries from Islam's Advance tagged with 'Kyrgyzstan'
Islamist Stirrings in the 'Stans
The Muslim republics of Central Asia may be far from the currents of mainstream Islam and the Islamist revival, but as James Pickett argues here, fundamentalist doctrines have found their way to the high peaks and plateaus of the region some affectionately refer to as The 'Stans. Pickett, a contributor at the excellent neweurasia.net website, explains how the region's traditional brand of Sufi and Buddhist-influenced Islam, already railroaded once by the Soviets, is now facing a new and more pervasive challenge...
The plot of David Ignatius's Cold War thriller Siro revolves around a group of CIA agents determined to overthrow the Soviet Union by striking at a vital weak spot: masses of restless Central Asian Muslims just waiting for the opportunity to throw off their atheist oppressors. In reality, the Soviet assault on religion in Central Asia was to a great extent successful: they eliminated the region's entire Islamic judicial and theological infrastructure, which dated back centuries and played a central role in governing daily life.
