Oil, war and stirring imperial ghosts

The Caucasus - At history's centre Monday INTREPID travellers have long had a penchant for visiting the Caucasus. This is a land of mountains and seas, squeezed into the borders of three old empires—Persian, Ottoman and Russian. As such it has been strategically important (and remains so, as we learned again in the short war that Russia fought against Georgia in August). And it has an enticing whiff of exoticism, associated with all the old images of fierce mountain tribesmen who spent the 19th century resisting successive attacks by the Russians, always keen to incorporate the Caucasus into their empire. The city of Baku, where I begin my trip to the three countries of the south Caucasus (Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia), was an important Russian base during most of those wars. The old walled town in the centre retains an... [read full story]