Russia’s Invasion Of Ukraine Has Upset Uzbekistan’s Nuclear Plans

When Uzbekistan fired the starting pistol four years ago on plans to go nuclear as a way to address the chronic energy shortages that plague it every winter, the world was a different place. Russian President Vladimir Putin was not an international pariah. And Shavkat Mirziyoyev, his Uzbek counterpart, was courting him as a guest of honor in Tashkent. The high point of Putin’s visit was when he and Mirziyoyev symbolically inaugurated the start of a project to build an $11 billion nuclear power plant in an area just east of Bukhara. The work…