Asking the right questions: environmental conflict in the case of Azerbaijan

This paper contributes an empirical test of key themes of the literature on natural resource conflict. Survey and interview data from an ongoing project in Azerbaijan provide insights into an unexpected lack of conflict in Azerbaijan related to the environment, resources and energy despite the predictions of resource conflict literature. We contend that questions about public perceptions about the environment and other daily concerns are critical if we are to understand who is likely (or unlikely) to be involved in conflict and why. The data presented in this paper demonstrate that Azerbaijani citizens rank environmental and resource issues among their immediate concerns and their top concerns for the country. However, compared to other day-to-day concerns such as the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and economic concerns, environment-related concerns do not appear to be sufficient to motivate widespread violent conflict or citizen dissent related to environmental or natural resource conditions.     

Eocene paleomagnetism of the Caucasus (southwest Georgia): oroclinal bending in the Arabian syntaxis

The Caucasus is very important for our understanding of tectonic evolution of the Alpine belt, but only a few reliable paleomagnetic results were reported from this region so far. We studied a collection of more than 300 samples of middle Eocene volcanics and volcano-sedimentary rocks from 10 localities in the Adjaro–Trialet tectonic zone (ATZ) in the western part of the Caucasus. Stepwise thermal demagnetization isolates a characteristic remanent magnetization (ChRM) in 19 sites out of 31 studied. ChRM reversed directions prevail, and a few vectors of normal polarity are antipodal to the reversed ones after tilt correction. The fold test is positive too, and we consider the ChRM primary. Analysis of Tertiary declinations and strikes of Alpine folds in the Adjaro–Trialet zone and the Pontides in Northern Turkey shows a large data scatter; Late Cretaceous data from the same region, however, reveal good correlation between paleomagnetic and structural data. Combining Late Cretaceous and Tertiary data indicates oroclinal bending of the Alpine structures which are locally complicated with different deformation. The overall mean Tertiary inclination is slightly shallower than the reference Eurasian inclination recalculated from one apparent polar wander path (APWP), but agrees with other. This finding is in accord with geological evidence on moderate post-Eocene shortening across the Caucasus. We did not find any indication of long-lived paleomagnetic anomalies, such as to Cenozoic anomalously shallow inclinations further to the east in Central Asia.     

Late Palaeozoic to Triassic evolution of the Turan and Scythian platforms: The pre-history of the Palaeo-Tethyan closure

A number of en échelon-arranged, southwest-facing arc fragments of Palaeozoic to Jurassic ages, sandwiched between two fairly straight east-northeast trending boundaries, constitute the basement of the Scythian and the Turan platforms located between the Laurasian and Tethyside units. They have until now largely escaped detection owing to extensive Jurassic and younger cover and the inaccessibility of the subsurface data to the international geological community. These units are separated from one another by linear/gently-curved faults of great length and steep dip. Those that are exposed show evidence of strike-slip motion. The arc units originally constituted parts of a single “Silk Road Arc” located somewhere south of the present-day central Asia for much of the Palaeozoic, although by the late Carboniferous they had been united into a continental margin arc south of the Tarim basin and equivalent units to the west and east. They were stacked into their present places in northern Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Caucasus and the northern Black Sea by large-scale, right-lateral strike-slip coastwise transport along arc-slicing and arc-shaving strike-slip faults in the Triassic and medial Jurassic simultaneously with the subductive elimination of Palaeo-Tethys. This gigantic dextral zone (“the Silk Road transpression”) was a trans-Eurasian structure and was active simultaneously with another, similar system, the Gornostaev keirogen and greatly distorted Eurasia. The late Palaeozoic to Jurassic internal deformation of the Dniepr–Donets aulacogen was also a part of the dextral strain in southern Europe. When the emplacement of the Scythian and Turan units was completed, the elimination of Palaeo-Tethys had also ended and Neo-Tethyan arcs were constructed atop their ruins, mostly across their southern parts. The western end of the great dextral zone that emplaced the Turan and Scythian units horsetails just east of north Dobrudja and a small component goes along the Tornquist–Teisseyre lineament.     

Petrogenesis of the Late Cenozoic collision volcanism in the central part of the Lesser Caucasus (Azerbaijan)

The Late Cenozoic volcanics of the Lesser Caucasus have similar trace-element and REE patterns with negative anomalies of Nb, Ta, Hf, and Zr. They are highly enriched in Rb, Ba, Th, and La and depleted in Ti, Yb, and Y with respect to N-MORB, which indicates their formation from the subduction-metasomatized lithospheric mantle. Partial melting of the subcontinental mantle lithosphere and crustal assimilation and fractional crystallization controlled the magma evolution in the collisional magmatic belts.     

Joint analysis of seismological data by the USSO and DSS stations in the Caucasus region

This paper deals with a procedure of a joint analysis of seismic data from earthquakes and those obtained by DSS. The DSS data are used as a first approximation to construct a two-dimensional model of the medium made up of individual blocks. These models serve as a basis when constructing specific three-dimensional travel-time curves. These travel-time curves are further used for the calculation of hypocenter parameters in a laterally inhomogeneous block medium.The hypocenter field and the travel times obtained are input data for the computation of three-dimensional fields of velocities in earthquake focal zones. Results of applying the proposed procedure to the Caucasus region are presented.     

基于地缘位势模型的中国与南高加索三国地缘关系探讨

特殊的地理位置与突出的资源禀赋优势致使南高加索三国向来为多个文明交汇和大国博弈的地区,探究中国与其地缘关系的演变对双方的经济与地缘合作具有重要意义。论文在国际关系学权力理论的基础上,构建地缘位势模型刻画2000—2020年中国与南高加索三国的地缘关系演变特征。研究发现：①2000—2020年中国在南高加索三国的地缘位势呈现出逐年上升趋势与“三阶段”演变特征,即2000—2005年为低位稳定阶段,2006—2012年为起步增长阶段,2013—2020年为快速增长阶段。②从2000—2020年地缘位势平均值、增长速度与增长幅度3个方面看均呈现出中国—亚美尼亚>中国—阿塞拜疆>中国—格鲁吉亚的空间特征。截至2020年,中—亚地缘位势最高;从地缘位势时序特征看,中国—亚美尼亚起步水平低,后期快速上升;中国—阿塞拜疆起步水平高,后期波动上升;中国—格鲁吉亚起步水平低,后期均匀上升。③影响双方地缘关系演变的驱动因素分为正向驱动力与负向驱动力。正向驱动力包括地缘区位、地缘经济、地缘文化与地缘外交,其中地缘区位是本底力,地缘经济是主导力,地缘文化是潜在力,地缘外交是根源力。负向驱动力一方面包括南高加索三国内部地缘政治的欠稳定性因素与地缘文化的强分裂性因素,另一方面包括中国对南高加索三国地缘外交的难介入性因素与地缘经济的弱竞争性因素。两类驱动系统的内部各要素相互作用,共同影响双方地缘关系的演变。     

Continental accretion and incremental deformation in the thermochronologic evolution of the Lesser Caucasus

Apatite fission-track analysis and thermochronologic statistical modeling of Precambrian-Oligocenc plutonic and metamorphic rocks from the Lesser Caucasus resolve two discrete cooling episodes.Cooling occurred during incremental crustal shortening due to obduction and continental accretion along the margins of the northern branch of the Neotethys.(1) The thermochronometric record of a Late Cretaceous(Turonian-Maastrichtian) cooling/exhumation event,coeval to widespread ophiolite obduction,is still present only in a relatively small area of the upper plate of the Amasia-Sevan-Akera(ASA) suture zone,i.e.the suture marking the final closure of the northern Neotethys during the Paleogene.Such area has not been affected by significant later exhumation.(2) Rapid cooling/exhumation occurred in the Early-Middle Miocene in both the lower and upper plates of the ASA suture zone,obscuring previous thermochronologic signatures over most of the study area.Miocene contractional reactivation of the ASA suture zone occurred contemporaneously with the main phase of shortening and exhumation along the Bitlis suture zone marking the closure of the southern branch of the Neotethys and the ensuing ArabiaEurasia collision.Miocene collisional stress from the Bitlis suture zone was transmitted northward across the Anatolian hinterland,which was left relatively undeformed,and focused along preexisting structural discontinuities such as the eastern Pontides and the ASA suture zone.     

土耳其-高加索-喜马拉雅一线白垩纪大洋红层对比

通过收集土耳其、高加索和特提斯喜马拉雅地区的白垩纪地层资料,着重对比研究上白垩统大洋红层的分布格局和沉积特征,为进一步进行全球大洋红层对比提供基础数据和资料。对比分析表明:它们具有环特提斯该时代近于同期地层的一般特征,其时代一般为Turonian Campanian期,在特提斯喜马拉雅地区跨度较大,为Albian Campanian期,岩性主体为灰岩,颜色与Fe2O3 的含量密切相关,富含浮游有孔虫及其组合,沉积速率低,沉积环境一般为半深海,沉积深度为500~1 000 m。     

Prolonged Variscan to Alpine history of an active Eurasian margin (Georgia, Armenia) revealed by Ar/Ar dating

Variscan to Alpine magmatic activity on the North Tethys active Eurasian margin in the Caucasus region is revealed by ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar ages from rocks sampled in the Georgian Crystalline basement and exotic blocs in the Armenian foreland basin. These ages provide insights into the long duration of magmatic activity and related metamorphic history of the margin, with: (1) a phase of transpression with little crustal thickening during the Variscan cycle, evidenced by HT-LP metamorphism at 329–337 Ma; (2) a phase of intense bimodal magmatism at the end of the Variscan cycle, between 303 and 269 Ma, which is interpreted as an ongoing active margin during this period; (3) further evolution of the active margin evidenced by migmatites formed at ca. 183 Ma in a transpressive setting; (4) paroxysmal arc plutonic activity during the Jurassic (although the active magmatic arc was located farther south than the studied crystalline basements) with metamorphic rocks of the Eurasian basement sampled in the Armenian foreland basin dated at 166 Ma; (5) rapid cooling suggested by similar within-error ages of amphibole and muscovite sampled from the same exotic block in the Armenian fore-arc basin, ascribed to rapid exhumation related to extensional tectonics in the arc; and finally (6) cessation of ‘Andean’-type magmatic arc history in the Upper Cretaceous. Remnants of magmatic activity in the Early Cretaceous are found in the Georgian crystalline basement at c. 114 Ma, which is ascribed to flat slab subduction of relatively hot oceanic crust. This event corresponds to the emplacement of an oceanic seamount above the N Armenian ophiolite at 117 Ma. The activity of a hot spot between the active Eurasian margin and the South Armenian Block is thought to have heated and thickened the Neo-Tethys oceanic crust. Finally, the South Eurasian margin was uplifted and transported over this hot oceanic crust, resulting in the cessation of subduction and the erosion of the southern edge of the margin in Upper Cretaceous times. Emplacement of Eocene volcanics stitches all main collisional structures.