Central Asian USSR

Central Asian USSR, also Soviet Central Asia, former designation for a region of western Central Asia extending from the Caspian Sea on the west to China on the east; the southern boundary was formed by Iran and Afghanistan. The northern boundary was less clearly defined. One interpretation placed it at the southern border of the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR), while another placed it at the northern border of the Kazakh SSR. Still other interpretations placed the boundary somewhere between the two extremes. Administratively, during the Soviet period, the region comprised the following SSRs: Tadzhik (also spelled Tajik), Turkmen, Uzbek, and Kirghiz (also spelled Kyrgyz), and portions of the Kazakh SSR, the size of which depended on the placement of the northern boundary. Russian domination of the area dates from the second half of the 19th century, before which much of the territory was ruled by the khanates of Bukhara, Khiva, and Kokand. In a summit meeting in January 1993, the leaders of the independent republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan agreed to apply the term to all five of their countries collectively. The term Central Asia is sometimes used to denote the inclusion of adjacent portions of China, Mongolia, Afghanistan, Iran, and the Himalayan lands.