Trade Is Slowly Opening One of the World's Most Isolated Nations

Azerbaijan is working hard to coax Turkmenistan out of its shell and integrate Ashgabat into trans-Caspian trade routes. Azerbaijani leader Ilham Aliyev exchanged a variety of trade-related agreements with Turkmenistan’s titular head of state, Serdar Berdymukhamedov, during a June 22 ceremony in Baku. A joint statement issued after the ceremony highlighted an agreement to streamline “technical specifications” concerning the movement of goods and vehicles between the two countries, and another to harmonize “customs statistics…