The first international treaty systems appeared in the ancient world: in the aftermath of the Battle of Qadeš between the Egyptians and the Hittites at the end of May 1,274 BC. The specificities of international relations are determined by the three most important components: international law, geopolitics and ideology. Their dreams, however, were not destined to become true, as wars have multiplied and hunger is claiming more victims than ever before, with the spectre of wars over water resources now looming large. A kind of Paradise on Earth, where everyone would suddenly be happy, and wars – but first and foremost hunger – would disappear. The decline of the bipolar system in international relations in the early 1990s was accompanied by great expectations of politicians and experts, who dreamt of the advent of a world based on the rule of law. Therefore, when they write about these countries, they rely on the classic languages of imperialism – English and French – with all that inevitably follows in geometric progression.
Moreover, many experts in the West talk about such topics, but do not really know the local culture or languages. The idea of promoting the human rights agenda in the image and likeness of the Western countries’ principles – as the repositories of Absolute Truth – is counterproductive and directly harmful in the Near and Middle East and Central Asia, as it does not consider the historical experience of these geopolitical regions.