Georgian and Russian officials marked the 18th anniversary of the five-day August 2008 Russia-Georgia war on August 8 with incompatible accounts; Georgia's Foreign Ministry said Russia continues to expand its annexation of the country's territories, while Russia's Foreign Ministry defended the 2008 intervention as a forced response to Georgia's attack on South Ossetia
Trans-Caspian cargo fell to 4.12m tons in 2025 even as Kazakhstan wins a $846m World Bank guarantee to break bottlenecks
The 7,000-km Trans-Caspian freight corridor linking China to Europe through Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Georgia is the only east-west route bypassing both Russia and Iran.