Opposition Claims Control in Kyrgyzstan/Kyrgyz Opposition Group Says It Will Rule for 6 Months

Opposition Claims Control in Kyrgyzstan
By CLIFFORD J. LEVY
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: April 7, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/08/world/asia/08bishkek.html?emc=na


MOSCOW — Large-scale protests appear to have overthrown the government of Kyrgyzstan, an important American ally in Central Asia, after violence between riot police officers and opposition demonstrators on Thursday killed at least 17 people.

The country’s president, Kurmanbek Bakiyev, fled the capital, Bishkek, on his plane, and the opposition declared that it was forming its own government.

Earlier in the day, the police used bullets, tear gas and stun grenades against a crowd of thousands massing in front of the presidential office in Bishkek, according to witness accounts. At least 17 people were killed and others were wounded, officials said.

Opposition leaders said the toll was as high as 100 people, but that figure could not be confirmed.

The upheaval raised questions about the future of an important American air base that operates in Kyrgyzstan in support of the NATO mission in nearby Afghanistan. American officials said that as of Wednesday evening the base was functioning normally.

The Obama administration has sought to cultivate ties with Mr. Bakiyev, angering the opposition, after he vowed to close the American base on the outskirts of Bishkek last year. He reversed his decision after the American side agreed to concessions, including higher rent.

Tensions had been growing in Kyrgyzstan over what human rights groups contended were the increasingly repressive policies of President Bakiyev, but it appeared that the immediate catalyst for the violence was anger over a sharp increase in prices for utilities.

Mr. Bakiyev made no public comment on Wednesday, and an official at the airport in Bishkek said in a telephone interview that Mr. Bakiyev took off from the airport on the presidential plane in the early evening. The airport official said Mr. Bakiyev was flying to Osh, a major city in the southern part of the country, but that could not be confirmed.

On Wednesday afternoon, fighting continued in the streets of Bishkek and other provincial centers. Video shot by protesters and uploaded to the Internet showed scenes of people clashing with and in some cases pushing back heavily armed riot police.

Reports from Bishkek said crowds of opposition members had entered government offices as well as those of the national television channels.

Dmitri Kabak, director of a local human rights group in Bishkek, said in a telephone interview that he was monitoring the protest on the central square when riot police officers started shooting. He said he had the sense that the officers had panicked and were not being supervised.

“When people started marching toward the presidential office, snipers on the roof of the office started to open fire, with live bullets,” Mr. Kabak said. “I saw several people who were killed right there on the square.”

The United States Embassy in Bishkek issued a statement saying that it was “deeply concerned about reports of civil disturbances.”

By late evening in Bishkek, it appeared that the opposition had succeeded in taking over the national television channels. In a speech to the nation, an opposition leader, Omurbek Tekebaev, a former speaker of Parliament, demanded that Mr. Bakiyev and the rest of his government resign.

Mr. Tekebaev was arrested earlier in the day along with some other opposition leaders, but later released.

Kyrgyzstan, with five million people in the mountains of Central Asia, is one of the poorest countries of the former Soviet Union, and has long been troubled by political conflict and corruption.

On Wednesday, the Kyrgyz government accused the opposition of provoking violence. “Their goal is to create instability and confrontation in society,” the Kyrgyz Parliament said in a statement.

The government said it would deal severely with the protesters, but they did not appear to be deterred. The first unrest occurred on Tuesday in the provincial center of Talas, when opposition members stormed government offices.

Russia, which also has military facilities in Kyrgyzstan and a close relationship with the government, appealed for calm.

“We believe that it is important that under the circumstances, all current issues should be resolved in a lawful manner,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

Mr. Bakiyev easily won another term as president as president last year over Mr. Atambaev in an election that independent monitors said was tainted by massive fraud.

Mr. Bakiyev first took office in 2005 after the Tulip Revolution, the third in what was seen at the time as a series of so-called color revolutions that offered hope of more democratic governments in former Soviet republics.

But since then, he has consolidated power, cracking down on the opposition and independent news outlets.






Kyrgyz Opposition Group Says It Will Rule for 6 Months
By CLIFFORD J. LEVY
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: April 8, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/09/world/asia/09bishkek.html?th&emc=th


MOSCOW — After a day of bloody protests forced Kyrgyzstan’s president to flee the capital, a transitional government led by a former foreign minister said Thursday that it had dissolved Parliament and would hold power for six months.

But the Kyrgyz president issued a statement from an unknown location saying that he would not resign.

The unrest, which spread across the capital, Bishkek, on Wednesday, seemed to pose a potential threat to a critical American air base supporting the NATO campaign in nearby Afghanistan. But Roza Otunbayeva, a former foreign minister who has emerged as head of a coalition of opposition groups, said Thursday that the supply line would not be immediately affected.

“Its status quo will remain in place,” she said at a news conference in the Parliament building. But she warned: “We still have some questions on it. Give us time and we will listen to all the sides and solve everything.”

Opposition politicians, speaking on state television after it was seized by protesters Wednesday, said they had taken control of the government after a day of violent clashes that left 68 people dead, officials said, and more than 400 wounded.

Ms. Otunbayeva said an interim government would rule for six months to replace the repressive rule of Kurmanbek Bakiyev.

“You can call this revolution,” she said. “You can call this a people’s revolt. Either way, it is our way of saying that we want justice and democracy.”

Ms. Otunbayeva offered to talk with Mr. Bakiyev to negotiate his formal departure from power. She insisted that, with several provinces under the opposition’s control, Mr. Bakiyev’s rule was over. “His business in Kyrgyzstan is finished,” she said.

But Mr. Bakiyev said he would not step down and blamed the opposition for the violence on Wednesday, according to 24.kg, a Kyrgyz news agency.

“I, as the guarantor of the Constitution of Kyrgyzstan, declare that in the case of further destabilization, all the responsibility will lie with the leaders of the opposition, who will be punished according to the fullest extent of the law,” the statement said.

It was not clear where Mr. Bakiyev went after leaving the capital on his plane on Wednesday. Some opposition leaders said he was in the south of the country, in the area where he has longstanding family roots.

The unrest threatened to have regional consequences; neighboring Uzbekistan closed its border with Kyrgyzstan.

Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin of Russia spoke with Ms. Otunbayeva on Thursday morning, expressing the hope that order would be established there. Ms. Otunbayeva said “the people’s government created by her is fully in control of the situation in Kyrgyzstan, as well as the law-enforcement agencies and armed forces,” Mr. Putin’s office said. “At the same time, she said that the situation in the country remains complicated, and Kyrgyzstan needs economic support.”

Television footage broadcast on Thursday by the BBC showed evidence of widespread looting in Bishkek overnight with storefronts in a shopping mall smashed and shelves stripped of just about anything that could be carried away. The footage showed what was said to be extensive damage to the ransacked home of Mr. Bakiyev, whose whereabouts remained unclear.

On Wednesday, riot police officers fired into angry crowds of demonstrators who had gathered around government buildings to rally against what they termed the government’s brutality and corruption, as well as a recent decision to increase utility rates sharply. Witnesses said that the police seemed to panic, and that there was no sign of supervision. In several cases, demonstrators wrested their weapons away from them.

By early Thursday morning, opposition officials occupied many government buildings in Bishkek and were demanding that the president sign a formal letter of resignation.

A coalition of opposition parties said Wednesday that Ms. Otunbayeva would head the transition government.. “Power is now in the hands of the people’s government,” she said in a televised address on Wednesday evening.

Those same opposition leaders were angered last spring when Obama administration officials courted Mr. Bakiyev — who they admitted was an autocrat — in an ultimately successful attempt to retain rights to the military base, Manas, used to supply troops in Afghanistan. President Obama even sent him a letter of praise.

Russia had offered Mr. Bakiyev a sizable amount in new aid, which the United States interpreted as an effort to persuade him to close the base in order to limit the American military presence in Russia’s sphere of influence. After vowing to evict the Americans last year, Mr. Bakiyev reversed course once the administration agreed to pay much higher rent for the base.

An American official said late on Wednesday that flights into the base at Manas had been suspended.

Lt. Cmdr. Bill Speaks, a spokesman for United States Central Command, said late Wednesday that some troops and equipment scheduled to transit from Manas to Afghanistan were likely to be delayed because of the government upheaval and that the military was preparing to use other routes. Flights to Afghanistan were still suspended on Thursday, Reuters reported, quoting a NATO official in Kabul, Afghanistan.

The American attitude toward Mr. Bakiyev ruffled opposition politicians in Kyrgyzstan, who said it was shameful for the United States to stand for democratic values in the developing world while maintaining an alliance with him.

The Kyrgyz president’s son, Maksim, had been scheduled to be in Washington on Thursday for talks with administration officials. The opposition views the younger Mr. Bakiyev as a vicious henchman for his father, and was infuriated that he was granted an audience. The State Department said late on Wednesday that it had canceled the meetings.

Opposition leaders have been divided in recent weeks over whether they would continue to allow the American military base to remain, but it seems clear that they harbor bitterness toward the United States. And neighboring Russia, which has long resented the base, has been currying favor with the opposition.

“The political behavior of the United States has created a situation where the new authorities may want to look more to Russia than to the United States, and it will strengthen their political will to rebuff the United States,” said Bakyt Beshimov, an opposition leader who fled Kyrgyzstan last August in fear for his life.

Mr. Beshimov was one of numerous opposition politicians and journalists who in recent years have been threatened, beaten and even killed. Kyrgyzstan, with five million people in the mountains of Central Asia, is one of the poorest countries of the former Soviet Union, and has long been troubled by political conflict and corruption. Mr. Bakiyev himself took power in 2005 after the Tulip Revolution, one of a series of so-called color revolutions that seemed to offer hope of more democracy in former Soviet republics. Since then, the Kyrgyz human rights situation has deteriorated. Mr. Bakiyev easily won another term as president last year, but independent monitors said the election was tainted by extensive fraud.

Tensions in Kyrgyzstan have been brewing for months and seemed to be touched off in the provincial city of Talas on Tuesday by protests over soaring utility rates.

Then on Wednesday, thousands of people began massing in Bishkek, where they were met by heavily armed riot police officers. Dmitri Kabak, director of a local human rights group in Bishkek, said in a telephone interview that he was monitoring the protest when riot police officers started shooting.

“When people started marching toward the presidential office, snipers on the roof of the office started to open fire, with live bullets,” Mr. Kabak said. “I saw several people who were killed right there on the square.”

Dinara Saginbayeva, a Kyrgyz health official, said in a telephone interview that the death toll could rise, and that more than 350 people had been wounded in Bishkek alone. Opposition leaders said as many as 100 people may have died.

While the fighting was raging, security forces still loyal to the president arrested several prominent opposition leaders, including Omurbek Tekebayev, a former speaker of Parliament, and Almazbek Atambayev, a former prime minister and presidential candidate. They were later released after the government’s resistance appeared to wither.

While opposition leaders have promised to pursue a less authoritarian course, Central Asia has not proved fertile ground for democracy. Mr. Bakiyev himself took office declaring that he would respect political freedoms.

Whatever happens domestically, a new government will have decide how to balance the interests of the United States and Russia, which both have military bases in Kyrgyzstan and want to maintain a presence in the region. Paul Quinn-Judge, Central Asia project director for International Crisis Group, a research organization, said Russia had stoked anti-American sentiment in Kyrgyzstan in recent months, often over the issue of the base.

Nevertheless, Mr. Quinn-Judge said he suspected that opposition politicians would in the end decide to permit the base, though not before giving the United States a hard time. “My gut feeling is that it can be smoothed over,” he said. “But they have got to move fast to reach out to the opposition, and do it with a certain degree of humility.”


Nikolai Khalip contributed reporting from Moscow, Alan Cowell from Paris, and Elisabeth Bumiller from Washington.