Turkmenistan

Turkmenistan - Is officially known as the Republic of Turkmenistan. Turkmenistan is an Asian Country and shares borders with Afghanistan, Iran, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and the Caspian Sea. Turkmenistan achieved independence upon the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. Turkmenistan possesses the world's fifth-largest reserves of natural gas and substantial oil resources. The Turkmenistan Government is actively seeking to develop alternative petroleum transportation routes to break Russia's pipeline monopoly. One-half of its irrigated land is planted in cotton; formerly it was the world's 10th-largest producer. The government has sought to improve the health and education systems, ordered unification of the country's dual currency exchange rate, begun decreasing state subsidies for gasoline, signed an agreement to build a gas line to China, and created a special tourism zone on the Caspian Sea. The region's written history begins with its conquest by the Achaemenid Empire, as the region was divided between the satrap's of Margiana, Khwarizmi, and Parthia.
Alexander the Great conquered the territory in the fourth century BCE on his way to South Asia, around the time that the Silk Road was established as a major trading route.