Geography of Uzbekistan in power but also to the very survival of Uzbekistan, the increasingly grave environmental threat will not be addressed effectively. The Government of Uzbekistan joined forces with Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan in 1992 to form the International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea (IFAS) and in 1993 to form the Interstate Council on the Problems of the Aral Sea Basin (ICAS). The ICAS was formed to work with the World Bank in order to improve the conditions of the Aral Sea, but was disbanded in 1997 to form IFAS. The Uzbekistan government along with NGOs and U.S. international donors
Seto Inland Sea on a cruise on the Setuchi. Some sites along the Seto Inland Sea were featured in eighth-century Japanese literature, both in prose and in verse, including "Kojiki", "Nihon Shoki", and "Man'yōshū". Since some sites were used as places of exile, their feeling and landscape were evoked in waka. In fiction, in "The Tale of Genji", Genji fled from Kyoto and resided in Suma (now a part of Kobe) and Akashi for two years. In medieval literature, because of the Genpei War, the Seto Inland Sea is one of the important backgrounds of "The Tale of the Heike", particularly in its