Ethnic Uzbek women cry as they listen to U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Robert Blake during his visit to a refugee camp in the village of Yorkishlak on the Kyrgyz-Uzbek border, some 400 km (249 miles) east of Tashkent, June 18, 2010. The United States called on Friday for an international investigation into ethnic violence in Kyrgyzstan, as its leader said the death toll could be 10 times higher than the official tally of 190. REUTERS/Shamil Zhumatov (UZBEKISTAN - Tags: CIVIL UNREST DISASTER IMAGES OF THE DAY)
12 Jun 2010 13:31:25 GMT
Source: Reuters
June 12 (Reuters) - Kyrgyzstan appealed for Russian help to stop ethnic fighting that killed at least 63 and left parts of its second-largest city in flames, the worst violence since the president was toppled in April.
The interim government in Kyrgyzstan, which hosts U.S. and Russian military bases, said it was powerless to stop armed gangs from burning down the homes and businesses of ethnic Uzbeks in parts of Osh. Gun battles raged throughout the night.
Here are some details on Kyrgyzstan's flashpoint area where hundreds have been killed in unrest in the last 20 years:
* ETHNIC TENSIONS:
-- Kyrgyzstan is a mountainous, landlocked former Soviet republic bordering China, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
-- A conflict between Uzbeks and minority Meskhetian Turks in Uzbekistan, which started as a market dispute about the price of strawberries, killed 103 people 1989.
-- Arbitrary Soviet borders, which have stranded enclaves of Uzbeks and Tajiks in Kyrgyzstan, and Tajiks in Uzbekistan, contributed to heavy Uzbek-Kyrgyz riots months later in 1990.
-- Osh, capital of the south and Kyrgyzstan's second city, saw most of the clashes between ethnic Uzbeks and Kyrgyz.
-- Around 300 were killed in the Osh massacre -- sparked by land disputes -- before Moscow brought in troops to separate the warring sides.
-- In 2005, riots broke out initially in the southern town of Jalalabad as opposition activists denounced presidential election results. Osh fell to opposition control as protests swept across the country's south to demand the resignation of President Askar Akayev, a northerner.
-- The Akayev government fell on March 24, 2005. Opposition leader Kurmanbek Bakiyev became acting president and prime minister and Akayev fled to Moscow. Bakiyev in July 2005 won a landslide victory in a presidential election described as free and fair by Western monitors.
* FERGANA VALLEY:
-- The densely populated Fergana valley is largely ethnically Uzbek but is split between Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. The region suffered greatly from the nationalities policy of the 1930s that transformed the previously interconnected areas into something like a puzzle.
-- In general, Uzbekistan holds the valley floor, Tajikistan holds its narrow mouth and Kyrgyzstan holds the high ground around.
-- The valley mouth is narrow, but the actual valley is vast, covering 22,000 sq km (8,500 sq miles) and the Pamir and Tien Shan mountains that rise above are only dimly visible.
-- The Fergana Valley zone includes the Osh, Jalalabad and Batken districts of Kyrgyzstan, the Andijan, Namangan and Fergana districts of Uzbekistan and the Sogdiskaya district of Tajikistan.
-- The valley is a major centre of cotton and silk production, and the hills above are covered by walnut forests. The valley also has some oil and gas.
-- Poverty is widespread. Islamic militancy has deep roots.
* ISLAMIC TENSIONS:
-- The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) that emerged from the Fergana Valley has cooperated with the Tajik United Opposition, Al-Qaeda elements and the Afghan Taliban with the aim of establishing an Islamic Caliphate. It is active in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Afghanistan.
-- Hizb ut-Tahrir, another outlawed Islamist group, says ideas of Islamic rule are beginning to catch on in Osh. The city has long been synonymous with a post-Soviet rise of radical Islamism in the largely agrarian, cotton-growing region. There are no accurate figures on membership of the group. Some estimates put it at 8,000 in Kyrgyzstan alone.
Sources: Reuters/www.unifem.org/Janes (Writing by David Cutler, London Editorial Reference Unit)
----
Kyrgyz unrest instigated from outside -Uzbek leader
19 Jun 2010 05:17:36 GMT
Source: Reuters
(Adds quote, details)
BISHKEK, June 19 (Reuters) - Uzbek President Islam Karimov accused "outside" elements on Saturday of instigating a wave of unrest in neighbouring Kyrgyzstan and said neither ethnic Uzbeks nor Kyrgyz were responsible for starting it.
His remarks echoed those by Kyrgyzstan's interim leadership which has blamed the country's deposed and exiled president of masterminding the violence that broke out last week.
"Neither Uzbeks nor Kyrgyz are to blame for this," Karimov was quoted as saying by the official Uza news agency. "These disruptive actions were organised and managed from outside.
"Forces that organised this subversive act tried to drag Uzbekistan into this standoff."
Kyrgyzstan, a complicated patchwork of clans and ethnic groups, has been volatile since a revolt in April ousted President Kurmanbek Bakiyev, who is now in exile in Belarus.
Historically there has been a strong rivalry between ethnic Uzbeks and Kyrgyz but many residents and observers on the ground say Bakiyev loyalists who stayed behind are playing on ethnic divisions to regain strength.
Bakiyev has strongly denied any involvement in the events.
His departure triggered fierce competition among clans and criminal groups in the south of the Central Asian nation lying on a major drug-trafficking route out of nearby Afghanistan.
Uza reported that Karimov spoke to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton by telephone on Friday to discuss the situation.
"They ... exchanged views on ways out of this difficult situation and first of all on how to stabilise Kyrgyzstan as quickly as possible," Uza reported.
(Writing by Maria Golovnina; editing by Michael Roddy)
No comments:
Post a Comment