Craig Murray: Kyrgyzstan ... Death, dictators and the Soviet legacy
[Craig Murray was British Ambassador to Uzbekistan from August 2002 to October 2004.]
It is arguable that the wave of ethnic killings in southern Kyrgyzstan that started last Saturday – which has left hundreds of Uzbeks dead and tens of thousands homeless – is, at root, the fault of Joseph Stalin. The Soviet Union was in theory just that – a union of Soviet socialist republics. Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan were three of them. But whatever the theory, Stalin had no intention of allowing the republics to become viable entities or potential power bases for rivals. So he intervened personally and the republics were deliberately messed up with boundaries that cut across natural economic units and severed cultural and ethnic links.
The names Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan might give the impression that these Central Asian states are the ethnic home of the Kyrgyz, Tajiks and Uzbeks. They are quite deliberately not that. For example, the major Uzbek town of Osh, in the Ferghana Valley, which is at the centre of this week's violence, is over the border in Kyrgyzstan. The great centres of Tajik culture, Samarkand and Bokhara, are not in Tajikistan but in Uzbekistan, even though 90 per cent of the population of those cities remain Tajik- speaking – and are now subject to Uzbek government attempts to choke the language.
It is a remarkable feature of the latest chapter in the Great Game that the mountainous little country of Kyrgyzstan hosts major bases for both the Russian and the United States air forces. Both powers view Kyrgyzstan as occupying a strategically crucial position north of Afghanistan, on the route from Central Asia to China. But neither appears to consider that their security strategy might be enhanced not just by a military presence, but by alleviating the appalling poverty and bad government from which the people of Kyrgyzstan have suffered.
Like the other Central Asian states, newly independent Kyrgyzstan fell under the dictatorship of the local Soviet leader, but in Askar Akayev it had by far the best of an incredibly poor bunch, and the only one who was not a former member of the Politburo. Kyrgyzstan is severely disadvantaged by its geography. Distance from markets, poor communications and lack of infrastructure are a barrier even to the development of its mineral resources, but Akayev instituted the freest economy in Central Asia and undoubtedly the least oppressed society.
Sadly, time and the enjoyment of power whittled away at Akayev's democratic credentials. Censorship crept back apace. Deepening corruption centred on his children, and it was for the sake of their political futures that he eventually indulged in widespread vote rigging. When Akayev was overthrown in the 2005 "Tulip revolution", he went back to being a scientist in Moscow. This contrasted sharply with the experience of Uzbekistan a few months later. When demonstrations against President Karimov started to gather mass support in Andijan, Karimov unleashed his army and more than 700 protesters were shot dead. That effectively ended the wave of "colour revolutions" against ex-Soviet leaders.
Akayev's replacement in Kyrgyzstan, President Bakiyev, proved worse than his predecessor in precisely the same problem areas of vote rigging, media control and corruption. His old democratic allies deserted him and fought the 2009 election against him. Bakiyev's re-election in 2009 with 83 per cent of the vote was widely condemned...
Read entire article at Telegraph (UK)
It is arguable that the wave of ethnic killings in southern Kyrgyzstan that started last Saturday – which has left hundreds of Uzbeks dead and tens of thousands homeless – is, at root, the fault of Joseph Stalin. The Soviet Union was in theory just that – a union of Soviet socialist republics. Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan were three of them. But whatever the theory, Stalin had no intention of allowing the republics to become viable entities or potential power bases for rivals. So he intervened personally and the republics were deliberately messed up with boundaries that cut across natural economic units and severed cultural and ethnic links.
The names Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan might give the impression that these Central Asian states are the ethnic home of the Kyrgyz, Tajiks and Uzbeks. They are quite deliberately not that. For example, the major Uzbek town of Osh, in the Ferghana Valley, which is at the centre of this week's violence, is over the border in Kyrgyzstan. The great centres of Tajik culture, Samarkand and Bokhara, are not in Tajikistan but in Uzbekistan, even though 90 per cent of the population of those cities remain Tajik- speaking – and are now subject to Uzbek government attempts to choke the language.
It is a remarkable feature of the latest chapter in the Great Game that the mountainous little country of Kyrgyzstan hosts major bases for both the Russian and the United States air forces. Both powers view Kyrgyzstan as occupying a strategically crucial position north of Afghanistan, on the route from Central Asia to China. But neither appears to consider that their security strategy might be enhanced not just by a military presence, but by alleviating the appalling poverty and bad government from which the people of Kyrgyzstan have suffered.
Like the other Central Asian states, newly independent Kyrgyzstan fell under the dictatorship of the local Soviet leader, but in Askar Akayev it had by far the best of an incredibly poor bunch, and the only one who was not a former member of the Politburo. Kyrgyzstan is severely disadvantaged by its geography. Distance from markets, poor communications and lack of infrastructure are a barrier even to the development of its mineral resources, but Akayev instituted the freest economy in Central Asia and undoubtedly the least oppressed society.
Sadly, time and the enjoyment of power whittled away at Akayev's democratic credentials. Censorship crept back apace. Deepening corruption centred on his children, and it was for the sake of their political futures that he eventually indulged in widespread vote rigging. When Akayev was overthrown in the 2005 "Tulip revolution", he went back to being a scientist in Moscow. This contrasted sharply with the experience of Uzbekistan a few months later. When demonstrations against President Karimov started to gather mass support in Andijan, Karimov unleashed his army and more than 700 protesters were shot dead. That effectively ended the wave of "colour revolutions" against ex-Soviet leaders.
Akayev's replacement in Kyrgyzstan, President Bakiyev, proved worse than his predecessor in precisely the same problem areas of vote rigging, media control and corruption. His old democratic allies deserted him and fought the 2009 election against him. Bakiyev's re-election in 2009 with 83 per cent of the vote was widely condemned...