Country Profile: Uzbekistan

— -- A dry, landlocked Central Asian nation, which shares an 85-mile-long border with Afghanistan, Uzbekistan has an ancient and adventurous history that has seen ruthless raiders like the Mongol chieftain Genghis Khan, as well as harried traders journeying down the old Silk Road.

Since it gained independence from Russia in 1991, the former Soviet republic has been struggling to reinvigorate its largely agricultural economy by propping up its Soviet-style economy with subsidies and price controls.

Uzbekistan's current economic hardship is a far cry from its glorious heritage as home to some of the ancient world's most fabled cities, such as Samarkand, Bukhara and Khiva.

Prime territory in the Great Game, or the British and Russian contest for control of the tough terrain that makes up the Central Asian region, Uzbekistan was a Russian protectorate from the end of the 19th century until the establishment of the Soviet Union in 1924 when it turned into the Soviet Socialist Republic of Uzbekistan.

Although elections have been held since independence, Uzbek President Islam Karimov has widely been accused of suppressing freedom of the press and weakening the judiciary.

Battling Islamic Fundamentalism

A primarily Muslim country, with Sunni Muslims constituting 88 percent of the population and Eastern Orthodox comprising nearly 10 percent, Uzbekistan has in the past few years been waging a fierce struggle against Islamic extremists operating from the pool of former mujahideen who have been operating in Kashmir, Chechnya and other hot spots in the region.

A critical point in modern Uzbekistan's fight against the tide of Islamic extremism was reached in 1999 when a series of bombings, allegedly linked to hard-line Islamic groups, ripped the capital of Tashkent.

As a former Soviet republic and a nation that has waged a 10-year war on Islamic fundamentalism, Uzbekistan is considered a natural ally in the U.S.-led fight against terrorism following the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.