[THS] At least 100 killed as protests sweep Kyrgyzstan

[Peter Webster]

At least 100 killed as protests sweep Kyrgyzstan:

Anti-government protests swept across the Central Asian nation of Kyrgyzstan on
Wednesday as thousands of protesters stormed the main government building, set
fire to the prosecutor's office and looted state TV headquarters. At least 100 people
were killed and least 180 wounded in clashes.
http://snipurl.com/vbaox


Interior minister killed in Kyrgyzstan uprising:

Opposition followers killed Kyrgyzstan's interior minister, took the deputy prime
minister hostage and captured state television in a deadly revolt Wednesday against
President Kurmanbek Bakiyev.
http://snipurl.com/vbap1


http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25156.htm

In Kyrgyzstan the Tulips Turn Blood Red

By Scott Horton

April 07, 2010 "Harpers" - - The tulips are pushing up, so it must be time for more
political tremors in the home of the “Tulip Revolution,” the mountainous Central Asian
republic of Kyrgyzstan. Yesterday demonstrators tried to storm government buildings
in the remote administrative center of Talas, and today protest actions swept across
the country’s north. Here’s a summary of the latest developments in the Guardian:

    At least 180 people in Kyrgyzstan have been wounded and 17 killed in clashes
between riot police and anti-government demonstrators. Police opened fire when
thousands of protesters tried to storm the main government building in the capital
Bishkek and overthrow the regime. Reporters saw bodies lying in the main square
outside the office of Kurmanbek Bakiyev, the central Asian republic’s president, and
opposition leaders said that at least 17 people were killed in the violence.

    Bakiyev declared a state of emergency, as riot police firing tear gas and flash
grenades beat back the crowds. There were also unconfirmed reports that the
country’s interior minister had been beaten by an angry mob. Opposition activist
Shamil Murat told Associated Press that he saw the dead body of minister Moldomusa
Kongatiyev in a government building in the western town of Talas. Murat said the
protesters beat up Kongatiyev and forced him to order his subordinates in the Kyrgyz
capital of Bishkek to stop a crackdown on an opposition rally there. The protests,
which began last week in several Kyrgz provincial cities, erupted today in Bishkek
when around 200 people gathered outside the offices of the main opposition parties.

    Demonstrators dodged attempts by police to stop them and marched towards the
centre of the city, reports said. The crowd, armed with iron bars and stones, then
tried to seize the main government building using an armoured vehicle. Several shots
rang out from the building, the White House. Opposition activists also took over the
state TV channel, broadcasting speeches in support of the uprising.

What has precipitated this unrest? A weak economy, high unemployment, crushing
poverty. But Kyrgyzstan is a very poor country, and the people are used to making do
with very little. Expectations are not high. The more immediate precipitant is
corruption. Kyrgyz felt their concerns about out-of-control corruption by the
leadership were validated when Italian criminal-justice authorities issued a warrant
for the arrest of a close business associate of President Bakiyev’s son, Maksim, in
connection with a fraud investigation. Then both the president and the opposition
convened a kurultai–invoking the ancient Kyrgyz tradition of spontaneous plebiscite to
decide important issues. It’s clear that things did not go as the government hoped at
these events; strong anti-government sentiment was apparent. And the opposition
emerged resolved to use the same tactics against Bakiyev that he used to come to
power in 2005.

The presence of fully-outfitted riot police discharging live ammunition into a crowd
usually brings demonstrations quickly to a halt. The Kyrgyz demonstrators, however,
regroup and strike back violently at the military and police forces deployed against
them. It may seem unlikely that such protests can succeed in the face of a trained
military and police force, but a popular uprising did topple the government just a few
years ago, in 2005.

The developments in Kyrgyzstan are being followed wearily in Washington, Berlin,
and London because of the Manas air base developed by the United States and used
by the NATO allies. It forms a key supply terminal in their northern logistical support
network, supporting military operations in Afghanistan. The protestors are focused on
the same facts. By and large, the crowds in Bishkek show no signs of being anti-U.S.
or anti-Russian, but they are concerned about the corrupt relationship that has
developed between the United States military and their leaders. Both former
president Askar Akayev and the current incumbent Kurmanbek Bakiyev developed
“special relationships” with the U.S. logistical supply point—as members of their
immediate families garnered sweetheart deals from the Pentagon that supported the
base operations. Kyrgyz political figures often sneer at American government officials
who preach transparency and anti-corruption tactics and then cut the most obviously
corrupt deals in the country.

I asked Alex Cooley, a Columbia University professor who has studied the politics of
the Manas air base, how he expected these developments to affect the relationship:

    The United States has founded its engagement with the Kyrgyz government on
providing lucrative contacts–for fuel and other Manas-related services–worth
hundreds of millions of dollars to entities controlled by the Bakiyev ruling family. In
the event that the government collapses, its successor will deem these contracts
improper and will either terminate or renegotiate them. In fact, in the aftermath of
the Tulip Revolution, then interim president Bakiyev publicly denounced the airbase
deals that the United States had cut with the deposed Akayev family and demanded
a huge increase in base-related rent. The larger lesson for the Defense Department
should be clear: placating authoritarian regimes with private contracts and pay-offs
does not guarantee long-term stability of relations; in volatile political climates like
Kyrgyzstan, it may, in fact, sow the seeds for discontent and political challenges to
the regime.

But protestors also express anger at OSCE for providing military and police support,
as seen in this footage posted by Reuters TV, in which a woman shakes her fist in
anger at the heavy-handed techniques of the police, noting that OSCE has trained
the police to repress the people.

The unrest in Kyrgyzstan is among other things a test for the short-term, and
probably short-sighted, policies behind the U.S./NATO support arrangements in
Kyrgyzstan. The United States has curried favor with powerful political figures intent
on rent seeking. What happens when those figures buckle and fold in the face of
public unrest? The U.S. proclivity for “sweet deals” with those in power will
complicate things in time of transition.