Development of the foreign policy of the Republic of Uzbekistan during the Islam Karimov period and an overview of Turkish–Uzbek political relations: 1991–2016

From a historical perspective, the geographical region that we know as Central Asia has been called throughout history as Khorasan, Transoxiana, Turan, Turkestan, and Central Asia. The foundations of the Uzbek and Turkish states were laid in this geography, and that is why their relations have a long history of thousands of years. Moreover, they were defined as "two states-one nation". Turkey was the first state who recognized new Turkic Republics established as a result of the Soviet Union's disintegration. Uzbekistan is a country with the most important demographic structure in the Central Asian region. It has strategic value with underground resources and geopolitical importance with its geographical structure. It carries the potential of the leading country in the region. As the country shares the most similarity in cultural and ethnic structures with Turkish people, it can be considered for Turkey as the key to Central Asia. Although the relations between Turkey and Uzbekistan, which began in the framework of brotherhood and friendship at first, followed about thirty years of uneven course. This thesis follows a timeline that tells the most important events from the emergence of the first Turkic foundations on the lands of Khorasan and Transoxiana to the appearing of Uzbeks and leading to the present of the state. The political processes between Uzbekistan and Central Asia after the Soviet Union are analyzed in broad strokes. The thesis tackles the political and diplomatic relationships of Turkey and Uzbekistan in Islam Karimov's era dividing it into four periods: 'Convergence and Fusion Era,' 'Churning Period', 'Unsurpassable Crisis Era' and 'Relations Review Period'. Keywords: Turkey, Uzbekistan, Central Asia, Foreign Policy, International Relationships