Central Asia

After writing on the untimely death–no, criminal assassination–of Mr. Alisher Saipov, I’m noticing the Return of a Theme: the continuing loss of a precariously-positioned free press in Central Asia.  Here goes the round-up:

Central Asia in General:
One of the best English-language sources on Central Asia, the Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) , is now no longer promulgating stories.  Formerly funded by the U.S. Department of States’ Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, it is now a static web site.  What the heck happened?  The site says they have “completed one phase of their mission” and are “looking for more funding.”  This is not a good sign, especially given what is below this paragraph.

Kazakhstan:
1. Opposition Web sites in Kazakhstan were shut down this week when Rakhat Aliev stepped up to the microphone.  Mr. Aliev accused Kazakhstan’s President Nazarbaev of ordering the death of his last credible opponent in the 2005 elections, Mr. Sarsenbaev.  Opposition parties published these accusations on the Web–and hence, good-bye, electrons. 

2. IFEX also reports the loss of independent news agencies in Kazakhstan as well as opposition party sites:

The International Foundation for Protection of Freedom of Speech “Adil Soz” expresses its deep concern over the recent mass repression against independent media in Kazakhstan. Websites http://www.zonakz.net, http://www.geo.kz, http://www.kompromat.kz and internet radio station http://www.inkar.info remain blocked since 23 October 2007. The website http://www.kub.kz was removed from the Kazakh segment of the internet without justification (see IFEX alert of 30 October 2007).

3. If you have any time at all, go read the article (linked above) at the IFEX site.  Because as of Yesterday, October 30th, Kazakhstan is now inspecting Newspapers as well.  Only the intervention of human rights defenders saved a computer with Subscriber’s Information on it.

Kyrgyzstan: 
1. The smear is on: Mr. Alisher Saipov, recently murdered, is now the target of a mudslinging campaign.  After the Kyrgyz police investigated and said that there was no evidence that Uzbekistan had anything to do with his murder.  Until they catch the actual murderer, that may well be true.  After a search of Mr. Saipov’s residence for Hizb-ut-Tahrir flyers, (none were found), police remain certain that Mr. Saipov was connected to extremist groups.  Fellow journalists are saying that of course he had contacts with HuT for the purposes of interviews–he had also interviewed Kyrgyzstan’s President Bakiev.  Does this mean that Mr. Saipov was connected to the president??  It’s a good point.

Since Mr. Saipov was employed frequently at Ferghana.ru, they are covering this story very carefully.  This article gives a timeline of the investigation so far, the accusations, and the defense.  Tell you what: it’s a murder.  It should get a complete and proper investigation regardless.

2. Ferghana.ru also has an article about the tight control by the government on Kyrgyzstani journalists.

Uzbekistan:
1. Referring to the last article at IWPR–a swan-song perhaps– “Uzbekistan officials tight-lipped about elections” posted September 26th.  If we don’t support a free press in Central Asia, who is going to do it?  If nothing else, the continual harrassment and death of journalists in the region show that they cannot do it alone.

2. Whether Uzbekistani government officials killed Mr. Saipov or not, the television program that marked him certainly set up a precondition. 

Further reading:
European Union Presidency on the death of Mr. Alisher Saipov, citing his work

Photo: thank you, gazdi.dox.hu for the perfect photograph

According to UPI: after a tip, Interior Ministry police set up a roadblock to catch some armed criminals.  They stopped a car with three opposition party officials instead.  Shots were fired and uh, apologies made.

Which brings me to the politics and elections currently up in Kyrgyzstan:

Cruising for trouble:
Ferghana.ru translated an ITAR-Tass editorial concerning the Kyrgyzstan referendum of October 21.  According to Mr. Usmonov, President Bakiev’s popularity continues to wane; the new constitution gives more power to the president than did the 2003 constitution (which precipitated former President Mr. Akaev’s retreat to Russia); and the referendum model was specifically chosen to change the constitution because the legislature would never have passed it. 

Add into this US concerns with free and fair election conduct during the referendum.  the concerns are that Kyrgyzstan only showed “marginal improvement” in election protocols.  The OSCE was not satisfied either:

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the [U.S.] embassy said the violations in the referendum included ballot-stuffing, the use of state resources to shuttle people to voting precincts and interference in observers’ work.

Post-referendum party organizing:
The new constitution and short election season favors large, established parties over small parties.  According to neweurasia.net, the new constitution spawned a lot of small parties–and one new party that is well-established: the Ak-Zol, briefly headed by Mr. Bakiev and most likely still under his aegis.  The splintering of opposition is probably natural enough, but it will not gain the opposition any power–or any say–in legislation. 

But as long as one is going to be stopped by Interior Ministry folks with guns after party meetings, the relationship of opposition to legal opposition is not forthcoming, now is it? 

Photo/montage: jupiterimages.com 

It’s making the rounds of the news: the death of another journalist in Central Asia.  Mr. Alisher Saipov, an ethnic Uzbek journalist who lived in Kyrgyzstan, has been killed.  He was 26 years old, and he was shot three times in the head and chest.

Mr. Saipov had begun to print an independent newspaper in the Uzbek language, which was printed in Kyrgyzstan and smuggled over the border.  This newspaper, or any one like it, would constitute the only “independent press” inside the state.  Two weeks ago, Uzbek television identified him as an enemy of the state, and showed his picture.  The rumors were that his death was worth USD 10 thousand dollars.  Now someone will collect.

Natalia Antalava at the Guardian has a requiem written for her friend and associate Mr. Saipov–and since she knew him, she can do a better job than I can of talking about his work.  One thing is clear: it is life-threatening to be a journalist in Central Asia. 

Ferghana.ru has an article which deconstructs the unspoken warning to other journalists:

Moreover, local journalists and analysts believe that whoever ordered Alisher’s assassination aimed to do away with a man who was a thorn in their hide and, also importantly, to intimidate his colleagues and all of the population of southern Kyrgyzstan. That is why the assassination was brazen and arrogant. Alisher had often worked late hours, calling it a day at 2 or 3 a.m. which made him an easy mark. But no, the assassins were ordered to murder Alisher almost in broad daylight and in a public place, so as to make a point and make other dissenters wary.

According to the same Ferghana.ru article, some Kyrgyz officials are up in arms–not about the crime itself–but that journalists always raise up to protect their own, while folks in other businesses and occupations die without the outcry.  The thing is, once there are no journalists, there is no journalism.  There is no free press to tell us what the political and economic forecasts are, where the traffic jam is, and who got the money.  The implications of Mr. Saipov’s death–along with the deaths of so many dedicated journalists–becomes a warning to each and every citizen: don’t pay attention to what your leaders do.  It is at once a human tragedy and a tragedy for two nations, a strike against the idea of democracy and the goal of transparency. 

It means so many things to all of us, and to Mr. Saipov’s family it means even more.  According to the news, Mr. Saipov was a new father.  His wife is seventeen years old.   

Yesterday, I went to the Center for Strategic and International Studies to hear a talk from Steve LeVine, author of The Power and the Glory, about Caspian oil and pipelines–one of my favorite topics in the world, as I wrote my Master’s thesis on it.  Independently related, oil prices pushed to over USD 90 per barrel yesterday afternoon in late trading on the spot market.  

High oil prices
We Central Asia watchers know that Caspian oil –particularly at this moment, the problems in Kazakhstan with the Kashagan oil field–have been affected by high oil prices, upping the stakes in negotiations over oilfield control.  Not to mention the prices for our heating fuels, our gasoline, and the new push to develop alternate energy.  Further, much of the citizen dissatisfaction in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan is caused by higher energy prices affecting the affordability of basic foodstuffs like bread and cooking oil.  Energy issues count as one of the problems with which governments must contend over which they do not have a great control. 

Even Russia, which looks like it is running its own energy end-run with Europe and independent oil firms these past two years, could not create the conditions that allow them the power that they presently enjoy.  It behooves us all to understand energy distribution and its relation to foreign policy.

Indirectly, a policy prescription
Steve LeVine gave an interesting talk, which mostly focussed on the “diplomatic triumph” of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline–and it was a triumph, that continues to bring 1 million barrels per day of oil to the Mediterranean and thence to Europe.  As Mr. Levine said, it was a time when governments worked with oil companies–for example,  the Brits with BP and the US with Chevron, Exxon, etc –in order to come up with a comprehensive diplomatic plan.  This flies in the face of the conventional wisdom.

Second, the consensus in the room appeared to be that the U.S. is failing diplomatically in Central Asia.  Key to this mistake is the new emphasis on missile programs in Czechoslovakia, with de-emphasis on Russia’s Gazprom and its acquisition of energy grids in Eastern Europe (and Armenia) and its new pipeline plans in the North and South, which will increase its distributional capability.  If we spend out time re-building the Cold War, we will miss the real avenue of power.  Germany is especially vulnerable at this time to Russia’s power/energy politics.

Third, the consensus of the oil veterans in the room was that Turkmenistan does indeed have enough gas (especially combined with that of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan) to make the construction of Trans-Caspian pipelines financially feasible.  With that consensus, one has to wonder: why has the U.S. not made more strides in Turkmenistan with Mr. Berdymuhammedov?  This question was not satisfactorily answered by anyone–and one could sense the frustration in the room.  Eventually, it seemed evident that we were expecting Central Asia’s presidents to step up to a plate and hit a home run for us, the way that Heidar Aliev did for the U.S. in Azerbaijan in the mid-1990’s.  Yet, all in the room agreed that the environment in Central Asia is very different ten years later.  As a policy, waiting on Kazakhstan’s and Turkmenistan’s Presidents won’t do the job for us, unless we take an active, supporting hand. 

However, as noted previously in this blog, the U.S. has essentially been pulling out of Central Asia for the past two years.

I recommend Mr. Levine’s book to all:  The Power and the Glory.  Available in a bookstore near you, and well worth the read.

I have this great book written by a Japanese thinker, R.G.H. Siu, and he says the following: “Ceremony without ulterior motive is amateur theatre.”  Uzbekistan is having presidential elections soon–a year past the deadline.  There are six candidates and five political parties.  Each of the five political parties is expected to draft a candidate for the Central Election Commission to put on the ballot.  The sixth candidate is: you guessed it, he who has already ruled by fiat for the past year.  I predict an outcome: the play will be a romance, with the incumbent and the state reunited for another decade, and the villains will be five.

According to ferghana.ru news agency, interviewing a (necessarily) anonymous political scientist:

The way I see it, we have in Uzbekistan all legal and political framework necessary for existence of truly independent political parties. Unfortunately, lack of traditions of a multi-party system and absence of political tolerance and pluralism prevent what political parties we have from becoming truly mass parties.

Yes, there is a Constitution.  Yes, there are political parties.  In particular, the Berlik and Erk parties have some renown even outside Uzbekistan.  But no, there is not democracy–opposition parties have been marginalized and branded with the “extremist” label. 

What Extremists? A connotative etymology for us all
Unfortunately, the word “extremist” had developed connotations in the world at large which cut off conversations in the middle and manipulate events and the telling of events.  One connotation of “extremism” refers Islamic fundamentalism alone.  There are other definitions, including “immoderate” or “excessive” which don’t carry the emotional baggage of the Twin Towers Massacre.

Second, the word “extremist” in Karimovian vocabulary also stands for the word “target”.  The bravery required in Uzbekistan for even consorting with an opposition party member requires a strength of personality and moral rigor that withstands justifiable fear–for one’s self, one’s family and business associates, friends, and so forth.  Personally, I think you would have to be somewhat extreme to stand up to Mr. Karimov’s engine of power.

The Elections
Still looking for information on the candidates and the election date.  When there’s updates, I’ll post them here.  Stay tuned . . . for the playbill.

Mongolia recently received its Millenium Challenge Corporation grant from the United States.  There was a ceremony and press conference on October 22 with President Enkhbayar of Mongolia and President Bush of the United States at the White House.  These were some of President Enkhbayar’s words, which well express the MCC aims of transparency, democracy, and poverty reduction:

As a partner country of the MCC program, Mongolia has been truly in the driver’s seat at every stage of identifying its own development priorities and investment needs and policy directions. This new approach of cooperation is the key to ensuring efficiency and effectiveness of the program. The compact prepared through the broad consultative approach in Mongolia will support our efforts to broaden and deepen the country’s economic development . . .

. . . Mongolia’s national development strategy [was] submitted to the parliament for the consultation and approval. The strategy sets out the vision of a democratic society centered on developing a healthy and educated citizen and a prosperous private-sector-led economy, a society of true partnership and Mongol stakeholders, including the civil society.

And that USD 285 million will be used, according to Mr. Enkhbayar, for:

I am confident that the compact program will have a truly transformational impact on Mongolia’s poverty reduction efforts through investment in our human capital, rehabilitation of vital transportation infrastructure and strengthening the institutional capacity of the public service agencies.

 . . . . We want our people to seize this opportunity to improve their livelihood with training and employment, to participate and benefit from the country’s economic growth; to have access to high-quality service and education.

 Following that announcement, there has been a cascade of new U.S.–Mongolia bilateral agreements, with U.S. domestic security in mind.  First, Mongolia’s Minister of Finance signed an anti-nuclear trafficking protocol with the U.S. Department of Energy Secretary –a Memorandum of Understanding against nuclear terrorism.  They are finding a Lot of Uranium in Mongolia these days, so this makes sense.  Some further reflection on neighbor states reveals that some of them also mine significant uranium, and some of them (the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea springs to mind) like to have uranium on hand.  Last of all, there’s plenty of non-state actors  who’d like to have it for their own nefarious purposes. 

As part of the Proliferation Security Initiative of the United States, Mongolia signed maritime ship-boarding agreements.  Though MSNBC/AP had a great laugh pointing out that Mongolia is home of the Gobi Desert and not the Pacific Ocean, Mongolia actually has 62 ships with “flags of convenience” in world shipping routes.   “Flags of convenience” signifies the use of ships registered in a foreign country to a. take advantage of diplomatic fast-tracking and consular services, and/or reduce taxation or regulatory incursions.  And there’s all that Uranium . . . so it’s a good idea–although it was nice to have the laugh.

Last of all, Mongolia’s Foreign Minister and the U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Negroponte signed a “Joint Declaration of Principles for Closer Cooperation” which a. has aspirational topnotes but also b. paves the way for future MOUs.

Dear President Enkhbayar and retinue, I hope you also had an excellent time in Washington.  Don’t forget to stock up on ball-point pens before you go home: I think you used all the ink you had.

Further reading:
Proliferation Security Initiative at the US State Department
Millenium Challenge, also a U.S. government Web site

Photos: Jwod catalogue, USDOS

International Community News:
Since The World Bank (the affectionate name for the United Nations’ International Bank for Reconstruction & Development or IBRD)  is having their annual meetings this month, there’s a lot of development news out there.  Central Asian governments who want to access the Bank’s programs need to know what priorities the Bank is currently working with in order to tailor their requests . . .  especially since the international aid environment is very tight right now.  Partly that low dollar-supply for aid is related to rising energy costs, which make food cultivation and distribution much more expensive for poor and developing states–and for the aid agencies that assist them.  

Agriculture
First, the IBRD is citing a new emphasis on small agriculture world-wide.  Though the report mostly covers Africa, it could be good news for farmers in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. 

Poverty Reduction, Development
Second, the President of the World Bank Mr. Zoellick will also be visiting China on behalf of poverty-reduction efforts later on this year. 

Third, Mr. Zoellick is also on record as saying that the private sector can take point on many development projects with the IDA and IFC arms of World Bank activities.

Environmental & Energy Issues
Fourth, in time for the Environment for Europe Conference (October 10-12, 2007), two key World Bank reports are out on Central Asia.  “Integrating Environment in Key Economic Sectors in Europe and Central Asia”, and “Integrating Environment into Agriculture and Forestry: Progress and Prospects in Eastern Europe and Central Asia” .  The Conference was held in Belgrade.  Here are some of the findings of the reports:

Failure to integrate environment into agriculture and forestry will have major economic and human health implications. For example, soil salinity in Uzbekistan is estimated to cost that country over €700 million per year, nutrient contamination of the Baltic Sea primarily from agriculture and forestry is estimated to have caused up to €4.5 billion in damages.

These two reports are available at this portal page.

Fifth, the IBRD will be increasing its funding for energy provision, particularly technologies under its Clean Energy Investment Initiative.  The Bank hopes to fund this with USD 10 billion over the next three years–as opposed to the USD 7 billion of the preceding funding period.  

The Asian Development Bank is also earmarking USD 1 billion for China and India for its Clean Energy and Environment Programme. 

Just an update. . . Have a great day, everybody!

Several times this year I have mentioned the burden that non-collection/non-publication of public health statistics places on neighbor states attempting to wrestle with epidemics.  This is true for Central Asia in terms of at least two issues: HIV and Avian H5N1.  Both Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan have been working through big problems with medical care and HIV transmission.  It’s bad, but you have to honor them for doing this in public.  Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, by virtue of long isolation, have not been as forthcoming.

Enter the World Bank, like a diplomatic superhero:

This week, the World Bank held a seminar in Uzbekistan which highlighted public health and HIV problems.  Because of this, we have an article on HIV in Uzbekistan that features some actual numbers.  Here are two relevant paragraphs:

Saidaliyev confirmed the growth of HIV\AIDS contraction in Uzbekistan (just the way it was growing throughout the world). Parenteral way accounted for 47% of all AIDS victims in Uzbekistan, [Note: parenteral means by injection] sexual for 17%, vertical (mother to newborn) for 17%, and origin of the remaining 34% cases remained unknown. There is something wrong with Saidaliyev’s arithmetic, because all these figures add up to 115%. That’s Uzbek statistics for you.

A 47% rate by needle sounds about right–or maybe low–part of that 34% of unknowns, no doubt.

According to the functionary, 2,203 people contracted HIV in Uzbekistan in the first nine months of 2007. Saidaliyev confirmed that nine had been infected with a subclavian catheter in Andijan this spring. Investigation was under way, he said.

This reporting, however statistically strange, needs to be encouraged and built upon and encouraged and built upon.

Further Reading:
Population Review Board’s backgrounder on rising HIV rates in Central Asia/Eastern Europe, 2002
U.S. State Department Fact Sheet, also from 2002

Photo: UNICEF, fighting HIV on a person-to-person level

Yesterday, October 21, 2007, the Kyrgyzstani people went to the polls to vote on a new Constitution–for the fifth time.  Previous referendums occurred under President Akaev in 1994, 1996, 1998, and 2003–the last one, combined with perceived/gigantic election fraud of 2005, sent Akaev into exile in the Russian Federation.  This will be Mr. Bakiev’s first referendum–and for the sake of national stability, we should all hope that it’s a good one.

However, not everyone is pleased with the new Constitution, saying that it is in places self-contradictory.  There’s some background on the poor planning at the Central Asia Beat and more background at neweurasia.net. Asel has done a great job of collecting local blog voices on the constitutional dispute (and its relation to daily life and corruption).  Mirsulzhan has written two articles in Russian that are linked there as well. 

According to AFP, state officials noted an 80% turnout for the vote.  75% of the turnout voted for the new Constitution; 3% voted against.  Local officials had received the word to get the vote out for a good referendum.  Some human rights watchers were noting ballot stuffing in the Bishkek area.  The OSCE did monitor the election, and we are looking for the reports.

Today, President Bakiev dissolved Parliament.  Though some news reports are reporting differently, Central Asian experts and Kyrgyzstan’s opposition leaders are saying that the Constitution gives greater power to the executive branch of government.  The new legislative elections will occur on December 16th.  Then new Constitution allows for proportional representation rather than a plural vote.

According to Wikipedia:

Proportional representation (sometimes referred to as full representation), is a category of electoral formula aiming at a close match between the percentage of votes that groups of candidates (grouped by a certain measure) obtain in elections and the percentage of seats they receive (usually in legislative assemblies). It is often contrasted to plurality voting systems, where disproportional seat distribution results from the division of voters into multiple electoral districts, especially “winner takes all” plurality (FPTP) districts. 

Various forms of proportional representation exist, such as party-list proportional representation, where the above-mentioned groups correspond directly with candidate lists as usually given by political parties. Within this form a further distinction can be made depending on whether or not a voter can influence the election of candidates within a party list (open list and closed list respectively). 
 

At any rate, it seems that politicians would like to concentrate on something besides political impasse–good choice– because Kyrgyzstan’s stability has been compromised since before the Tulip Revolution of 2005.  Mr. Bakiev has said he would like the government to work on economic development.  However, between political impasse and economic development there are several other qualities that need to be developed.  One would be transparency, which benefits both political and economic development.  And it should be noted that the combination of political privilege and economic opacity is what brought the Tulip Revolution in the first place.

Stay tuned for legislative campaigns in Kyrgyzstan . . .

Photos: CIA Factbook, Jamestown.org

In the Central Asia Beat, I referred to the Akhal-Teke horse, and then I found some video footage.  This horse show video shows a lot of the conformation, coloring, and other physical points of the breed–at its first European horse show in June of this year, in Luxembourg.  There’s no plot per se: it’s a vid for horse enthusiasts, 4 minutes. 

You can see why they are considered a national treasure: very distinctive looking horses, yes?  And now Mr. Karimov has one.