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Introduction The Pamir Alay and the Asan-Usan region Brief history and the current situation Getting there - The climate and the people
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| (Marco Borghetti, Roberto Invernizzi, Stefano Righetti by Marco Borghetti) For further information contact marco.borghetti@unibas.it |
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| Central Asia and its forbidden mountains
Central Asia - a place which immediately evokes the legendary Silk Road, the long journey undertaken by Marco Polo to the court of the Great Khan, and the religious-tribal fanaticism which, entwining around the secret aims of the greater and smaller powers, ensure that this "centre of the earth" is far too often the scene of terrible crises. |
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| Vast deserts, towering mountains and unending steppes play host to what was once a great and important people, now nomads. Here there are high plateaus and soaring peaks where, as in the words of Marco Polo, "no birds fly, so high and cold is it here". In recent times they have suffered at the hand of political "experiments", but this area is now free of Soviet domination.
This part of Central Asia, once not easily accessible or simply out of bounds, is not without reason described as being the "roof of the world", for it is from here that the highest mountains on earth branch away - the Karakorum and the Himalayas southwards, the Hindu Kush westwards, and the Tian-Shan off to the north east. The Pamir is an immense region, dominated by the giant Pic Communism (7495m) and Pic Lenin (7134m), once the highest mountains in the now defunct Soviet Union. Central Asia entices those travellers in search of new horizons, tired of seeing the "déjà vu", as the sheer number of unexplored valleys, untouched glaciers and huge, unclimbed rock faces is breathtaking..... |
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