Houston Chronicle - Turkmenistan's authoritarian leader has proven he doesn't only win elections easily, coming first in a car race he wasn't even supposed to take part in.

President Gurbanguli Berdymukhamedov drove to the racing track in a Bugatti sports car Saturday morning ostensibly to give his blessing to the former Soviet Central Asian nation's maiden automotive competition.

While an event presenter introduced the president, he received a request nobody in Turkmenistan would be likely turn down. "Can I take part?" Berdymukhamedov asked.
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The apparently choreographed display appears to be another episode in an ongoing state project to cast the president as an effortlessly competent man of action.

Natalia Antelava | April 11

BBC - The BBC has been told by doctors that Uzbekistan is running a secret programme to sterilise women - and has talked to women sterilised without their knowledge or consent.

Adolat has striking looks, a quiet voice and a secret that she finds deeply shameful.

She knows what happened is not her fault, but she cannot help feeling guilty about it.

March 23

BBC - Kazakhstan's shooting team has been left stunned after a comedy national anthem from the film Borat was played at a medal ceremony at championships in Kuwait instead of the real one.

The team asked for an apology and the medal ceremony was later rerun.

The team's coach told Kazakh media the organisers had downloaded the parody from the internet by mistake.

The song was produced by UK comedian Sacha Baron Cohen for the film, which shows Kazakhs as backward and bigoted.

Brian M. Downing | Jan 14

Asia Times - Hopes for a negotiated settlement in Afghanistan are beginning once more, but the problematic Byzantine geopolitics are not readily apparent. It is not the bipolar confrontation between Britain and Russia that it was in the 19th century. Nor is it simply the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) against the Taliban.

The war in Afghanistan involves Pakistan against India, China against India, the Pashtun Afghans against the northern peoples, Saudi Arabia against Iran, and Russia against China. So arcane and intricate are these conflicts that the US is allied with enemies and at odds with allies.

continue reading here

Hamid Shaikh | Garhi Khuda Baksh, Pakistan | December 27

Reuters - Pakistan's embattled but defiant President Asif Ali Zardari used the fourth anniversary of the death of his wife Benazir Bhutto to ensure supporters he would not resign in the face of numerous crises building around him.

Zardari, who became president after the former prime minister was killed in 2007 following her return from self-imposed exile, is facing perhaps the greatest threat to the government.

In a jab at the Supreme Court, which is considering an investigation into a memo asking the United States for help against the country's powerful military and which could implicate Zardari, he asked about the as yet unsolved case of his wife's assassination.

"People ask what happened to Benazir Bhutto's case," he said. "I ask (Chief Justice) Iftikhar Chaudhry: what happened to Benazir Bhutto's case?"

Joanna Lillis | Dec 29

The Independent - In a forlorn town in the oil-rich Central Asian nation of Kazakhstan, the hospital is jammed with patients. Some are groaning in the wards, recovering from gunshot wounds; others are fed by intravenous drips; one lies in a coma.

This is the Kazakh oil town of Zhanaozen, where clashes between security forces and protesters this month have left 15 people dead. The normally placid country paints itself as a bastion of stability and a haven for Western investors who have sunk billions into its oil and gas sector.

"I was just passing by and people were running at me," said Bekmurat Turashev, a young oil worker recovering from three gunshot wounds sustained when police fired on demonstrators. "There was shooting. I didn't understand a thing."

Hoping to suppress what some have speculated may be Central Asia's echo of the Arab Spring, Kazakhstan's strongman President, Nursultan Nazarbayev, has declared a state of emergency in Zhanaozen. Having brandished the stick, on Monday Mr Nazarbayev tried the carrot, sacking his own son-in-law, Timur Kulibayev, a billionaire businessman involved in the lucrative energy industry who was tipped as a successor to the 71-year-old President.

The streets of Zhanaozen teem with riot police, sent to restore order after an industrial pay dispute that had been dragging on for seven months turned violent. Many of Kazakhstan's citizens feel they have not reaped the benefits of the country's natural resources, and it is that sense of unfairness that erupted into protests this month.

The violence, just before next month's parliamentary and local elections, is an embarrassment not only to Mr Nazarbayev but also to his British adviser, Tony Blair. The former Prime Minister was hired this year to form a team of consultants to provide policy advice. Critics said he was using political spin to prop up a corrupt, autocratic regime. A spokesman for his office said he had played no role in the dispute.

Kazakhstan is not as repressive as some of its neighbours, but the politically savvy President has governed for two decades with an iron fist, quashing all opposition. He took 95 per cent of the vote in this year's presidential elections, though there were accusations of electoral irregularities.

Charlotte Chelsom-Pill (Reuters, AFP) | Dec 17

Deutsche Welle - A 20-day state of emergency was declared in the western Kazakh oil city of Zhanaozen on Saturday, a day after deadly clashes between riot police and crowds of laid-off oil workers resulted in at least 11 deaths.

The riots came after months of protests demanding better pay and work conditions.

Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev has ordered a night-time curfew and a ban on strikes and protests following the deadliest outbreak of violence in Kazakhstan's recent history.

The president's official website declared that the state of emergency will remain until January 5 to "ensure public safety, rebuild law and order, and defend citizens' rights and freedoms." Access to and from the city has also been restricted.

Clashes erupted on Friday when angry oil workers and sympathetic citizens stormed a stage set up in the town's main square to mark the 20th anniversary of Kazakhstan's independence. They later set fire to the city hall and the headquarters of the local oil company.

"They beat up peaceful citizens, smashed parked cars and set them on fire," the president said on Saturday.

"One must not mix up an oil workers' labor dispute with the actions of hooligans wanting to exploit the situation for their own ends," he added.

However, social networking sites on Saturday carried claims that police had opened fire on an unarmed crowd. They also suggested that the death toll was considerably higher than reported, with some claims as high as 50.

. . . look at these photos keep one important thing in mind: the same thing is happening in the Tienshan. And then Tien Shan is where Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and arguably Kazakhstan get all their water.

Bishkek/Moscow - | Aug 30

DPA - A US lease to operate military aircraft from Kyrgyzstan's Manas air base will expire in 2013 and Bishkek won't renew it, a senior Kyrgyzstan official said Tuesday.

'It should be a civilian transportation hub,' said Prime Minister Almazbek Atambaev in an interview with Russia 24 television. 'There shouldn't be any kind of military base there.'

The Kyrgyzstan government has already communicated to Washington its intention not to renew the air base lease, Atambaev said.

US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton during a December official visit to Bishkek said that Washington hopes to continue operating its military base in Kyrgyzstan in the battle against terrorism.
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Kyrgyzstan receives some 150 million dollars in US assistance annually, of which about half goes towards Manas airport operations, according to news reports.

Russia and China both have pressured Bishkek to close Manas air base to the US, and promised Kyrgyzstan billions of dollars in aid once US forces have left the region, Russian media has reported.

Hillary Clinton has a great idea: let's re-create the Silk Road! Of course, it's not quite as easy as she thinks. History is rarely as cut and dry and policymakers in DC believe it is.

I think the essay is pretty spot on. High policy makers like Clinton learn a dabble of history here and there and take a seductive phrase like "Silk Road," which the author is correct in pointing out its relatively recent coinage, and they use them to pursue phantom US policy goals without any real understanding of what's happening in the region. Never mind that water is so critical to the region--and that Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan hold most of the water, or that the simmering anger between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in the Ferghana Valley is very real. Never mind that Tajik speakers in places like Bukhara and Samarkand dislike being ruled by Karimov, too. Never mind that many of these cultures are still stuck in a qua-Soviet bureaucratic mindset.

And then there is Iran: the central link in the Silk Road--Khorasan, the province in Iran stretching from Meshed in the East to the foothills of the Zagros in the west was and always has been central to the trade of the vast Eurasian trade networks.

It's a pretty, sparkly idea, but I'd wager a Bering Strait tunnel gets built before a new Silk Road arises.

Ryskeldi Satke | ANKARA,TURKEY | 5/25/11

www.turkishweekly.net - British intelligence analyst and founder of AFI Research (UK), Richard.M.Bennett is the author of numerous works covering foreign intelligence aspects of geopolitical events in Afghanistan,Middle East and Central Asia.He also is the author of article "Old Habits Die in Kyrgyzstan" published by Asia Times (Hong Kong,China) where Mr.Bennett provided highly critical information on Russia's intelligence agencies involvement in organizing April 2010 uprising in Kyrgyzstan.A subject of discussion reflects ongoing instability in the region and specifics of current geopolitics in Central Asia.

Ryskeldi Satke - There is a debate within expert communities worldwide over involvement of Russia's intelligence agencies in recent political disturbances in Kyrgyz Republic.Some believe there is not enough amount of evidence pin-pointing at Kremlin as mastermind of coup d'état in Bishkek,others see direct Moscow hand in duet with Kyrgyz opposition organizing April 2010 violent protests.Your article ("Old Habits Die in Kyrgyzstan" April 13 2010) which appeared on Asia Times reflected some specific details of Russia's SVR (Foreign Intelligence) and GRU (Military Intelligence) handy work in neutralizing ex-President Bakiyev's security apparatus during April 2010.Since then majority of the world Governments came to peace with Russia's actions in Kyrgyzstan while political analysts characterize events in Central Asia as "Great Game" between the US and Russia.In your opinion, is it a deliberate calculated move by Moscow with long term strategy in Central Asia via Kyrgyzstan which is already hosting 5 Russian military installations? or it's a sporadic Kremlin exercise despite loosing broad ground in the region?

Jonathan Watts | Beijing | May 30

The Guardian - A communist official tipped as a future leader of China is moving to defuse a wave of protests in Inner Mongolia by choking information, tightening campus controls and promising to reform the mining industry.

A demonstration by ethnic Mongolians on Monday in the regional capital, Hohhot, was the latest test for Hu Chunhua, whose appointment as party chief of the resource-rich region last year was widely seen as a step towards top office in 2020.

Censors have blocked information about the biggest surge of unrest that the northern region has experienced in 20 years, with witnesses and rights groups claiming to have seen rallies in at least six communities over the past week.

Just where did the ancestors of the Tarim Basin mummies come from? Colin Thurbron, who has traveled the length and width of Eurasia addresses some of the speculation in this very interesting essay in the most recent New York Review of Books. His speculation jives with mine, which I discussed a few years ago:

In fact, the vast majority of the oldest mummies are more than likely of Indo-European extraction who probably spoke some form of Tocharian. The Tocharian language, the language of the Tarim Basin until the 10th century when the Uighurs invaded, is a distant cousin of the modern Indo-European languages. What's even more interesting about Tocharian is that it has more in common with the Celtic languages that are now mostly extinct than with the Indian or even Iranian languages one would expect them to share affinities with. This also throws into doubt much of the scholarly consensus on historical migratory patterns in the region. But more on that question in a moment. Mind you, this doesn't mean the mummies are the long lost ancestors of Molly Magee. However, it does mean that at the time when they broke off from the main body of Indo-European speakers was about the same time the Celts did.

Now, Thurbron doesn't mention Tocharian, specifically. The migration of peoples is much, much more complicated than a sole migration, deep in the mists of time past, depositing uncertain Caucasoid peoples in the arid wastes of the Tarim. But he does recognize their Pontic origins:

The provenance of this region’s early peoples is controversial. Traces of their presence date back to at least 2000 BC, and the direction from which they first reached the edges of Xinjiang’s bitter Taklamakan Desert is still uncertain. Some scholarly opinion locates their origins in the Andronovo culture of the Eurasian steppe, or perhaps still farther west on the fringes of Europe itself—and recent DNA analysis appears to support this.

But around the third century BC, the westward counterflow of Mongoloid peoples began in earnest, and some of the early sites in Xinjiang now lie a thousand miles within the borders of modern China. The complex ethnicity of the region’s inhabitants, the scattered sites of their settlement, and the intermittent centuries of their arrival all militate against their being better known. The culture and even the appearance of the earliest settlers—locked in uncannily preserved mummies—are not Chinese at all, but Caucasoid. They belong, astonishingly, with the West.

That this all happened a very long time ago is obvious, but what is not so obvious is that the migrations appeared to have continued for quite some time, settled down and then new migrations came from the East, specifically from the area of present day Mongolia. What drove this peoples to leave and move on? Was it environmental? Or was it (at least during the times of written history) more a kind of relentless encroaching on nomadic lands by the settled culture of China? I, obviously incline towards the latter. Regardless, read the essay. It's quite fascinating.

Borzou Daragahi | Kabul | Dec 12

Los Angeles Times - Afghan President Hamid Karzai met with regional leaders Saturday to sign an agreement for a massive energy project that could eventually net his country billions of dollars in revenue: a 1,000-mile natural gas pipeline whose proposed route cuts through the heartland of the Taliban insurgency.

As if to highlight the complications facing the project, at least 26 people were killed in attacks Friday and Saturday, including a Taliban commander and several people believed to be with a private security firm, Afghan and NATO officials said.

The United States strongly supports the proposed pipeline because it could draw Central Asia's significant energy resources to Pakistan and India an bypass Iran, Washington's top adversary in the region.

Karzai met with Turkmen, Indian and Pakistani officials in Ashgabat, the capital of neighboring Turkmenistan, to sign the accord.

"On this very important occasion, let me once again highlight our vision for regional cooperation, which is to contribute to regional stability and prosperity," Karzai said in a statement, "and to enhance the conditions for Afghanistan to resume its central role as a land bridge in this region."

But the proposed $7.6-billion TAPI Gas Pipeline project and any revenue it may generate may be years away. The planned route passes from Turkmenistan, a former Soviet republic, through violent territory still unsettled by insurgencies, including the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban, and the Pakistani city of Quetta, which is considered the home of the Taliban leadership.

Ryskeldi Satke | Bishkek, KG | 11.27.10

http://jetigenweekly.blogspot. - A Russian media and State controlled TV channels recent emergence in Kyrgyz Republic reflects a growing pattern of destructive "soft power" managed and streamed from Russia. Kyrgyzstan has been rocked by instability since April 2010 raising reasonable concern in Central Asian region, particularly in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. Both states share a sizable chunk of borderline with Kyrgyz. Russian newspapers, media and TV stations had not shown signs of excessive interest in political processes in Kyrgyzstan for a few years since March 2005 uprising when first Kyrgyz President Akayev had been thrown as a result of massive unrest in the country.

Nov 20

BBC - Turkmenistan has pledged to supply natural gas for the planned Nabucco pipeline - a major project that should allow EU countries to rely less on Russian energy in future.

Turkmenistan says it will have up to 40bn cubic metres (1,412bn cu ft) of spare gas annually, "so European countries need not worry".

The pledge came from Turkmen Deputy PM Baymyrad Hojamuhamedov on Friday.

Uncertainty about Nabucco's gas supply has been delaying the project.

The 3,300km (2,046-mile) pipeline is expected to pump up to 31bn cubic metres of gas annually from the Caspian region and Middle East across Turkey and into Europe.

In July 2009 Turkey, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary and Austria signed an agreement to build the long-planned pipeline.

Turkmenistan's announcement came at an international energy conference in the ex-Soviet republic's capital, Ashgabat.

. . . the following utterly illogical sentence is simply not going to be read:

Islam’s eternal preoccupation of how to reconcile itself with modernity

How to untangle that tortured knot? Seriously, who knew modernity was eternal?

. . . the spillover argument, but I think they called it the domino theory during the Cold War!

Okay, I'll cut the snark. I've been woefully remiss in not writing about Central Asia the last few years. So, let's review.

First, the biggest risk to Central Asian states are leaders like Islam Karimov, the dictator of Uzbekistan.

Second, as the post in question notes, another very serious and real risk is ethnic strife. As I noted many times during the Kyrgyzstan drama earlier this year, Kyrgyz on Uzbek violence is a serious risk.

Third, drug trafficking is a large risk as well.

One other serious risk that few are talking about, even while the Aral Sea disappears, is water. The vast majority of water that goes into Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Uzbekistan comes from the Pamir/Tien Shan glaciers. And they are melting at a rapid rate. Not only that but a giant water hog that goes by the name of China lurks on the border of almost every one of these nations.

So, let's be clear about one thing: the idea that a many headed IMU--jihadi-hydra is going to jump out of some Harry Potter set and take over Central Asia is silly.

Racht Valley, Tajikistan | September 20

RFI - Armed rebels killed at least 25 soldiers and injured 20 in Tajikistan on Sunday. The defence ministry says the gunmen are thought to be Islamist rebels from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Chechnya. The government has launched a major military operation in response.

The rebels ambushed a military convoy in the Racht valley, east of the capital and about 50 kilometres from the Afghan border.

Tania Branigan | Ulan Bator | August 2

The Guardian - Their right hands rise to black-clad chests and flash out in salute to their nation: "Sieg heil!" They praise Hitler's devotion to ethnic purity.

But with their high cheekbones, dark eyes and brown skin, they are hardly the Third Reich's Aryan ideal. A new strain of Nazism has found an unlikely home: Mongolia.

Ryskeldi Satke | Bishkek KG

www.theyoungturks.com - Ryskeldi Satke - The bloody events in southern Kyrgyzstan highlighted helplessness of the Provisional Government in emergency situations.We have seen it earlier on April 19 also in the pogroms of the ethnic Turks Meskhetians in the village of Mayevka near Bishkek. From June 10 to 13 the Government has failed to stop massacre and atrocities in the cities of Osh and Jalalabad. In your perspective, is third President of the Kyrgyz Republic, Rosa Otunbayeva capable to establish effective State authority throughout the country, given the presence of discredited officials in her team such as Sariev, Beknazarov and Atambayev taking into account a conflicting interests of political parties belonging to the newly installed Government ?

Bishkek | July 3

AFP - Career diplomat Roza Otunbayeva was sworn in as conflict-torn Kyrgyzstan's president on Saturday, making her the first female leader in the history of ex-Soviet Central Asia.

Standing before a crowd of more than 1,000 cheering onlookers at a packed soviet-era concert hall in the capital Bishkek, Otunbayeva somberly took her oath and promised a new political era for increasingly-unstable Kyrgyzstan.

"As president, I will spare no effort to create a new political culture for the country based on a strict adherence to the rule of law," she told the assembled crowd.

"I must be principled and consistently make demands on all branches of government to ensure it. The new policy can not be built on fantasies and illusions. It must become real and effective."

A former foreign minister and ambassador to the United Kingdom who took power on a wave of bloody street riots in April that ousted president Kurmanbek Bakiyev, Otunbayeva takes over at a delicate moment.

Kyrgyzstan has been wracked by violence and political instability since her government, comprised mostly of former officials from the Bakiyev regime, came to power in the April coup.

But the inauguration comes just days after the country overwhelmingly approved a new constitution making Kyrgyzstan the region's first parliamentary democracy, a move the government hopes will bring a measure of stability.

The new constitution slashes the powers of the president and sets the stage for parliamentary elections that authorities have scheduled for early October to bring in a permanent government.

Otunbayeva will serve as president until after 2011 elections, and will also occupy the post of Prime Minister until the upcoming elections are able to seat a new parliament.

Olga Dzyubenko | Bishkek | June 16

Reuters - Turmoil in Kyrgyzstan offers an ideal breeding ground for Islamist militancy in the Muslim region north of Afghanistan and the government must act quickly to curb any further violence, a U.N. envoy said.

Kyrgyzstan's ethnically divided south has been turbulent since a revolt in April toppled its president, Kurmanbek Bakiyev, and brought an interim government to power.

Russia and the West fear that instability in the ex-Soviet republic, which lies on a major drug trafficking route out of Afghanistan, could produce a safe haven to militants, particularly in the over-populated Ferghana valley.

At the link, you will find a story I wrote about my time in Kyrgyzstan. It should go a ways towards helping you understand how isolated the Kyrgyz Ferghana (and Osh and Jalalabad) is from trans-montane Kyrgyzstan, i.e., Bishkek and Naryn.

Southern Kyrgyzstan, that loathsome legacy of Stalin's ethnic policies, is coming unglued:

As the violence entered its third day, Uzbeks, who comprise perhaps a third of the population in southern Kyrgyzstan, appeared to be a minority group under siege. Some Uzbek families in Osh City were reportedly trying to go into hiding, or barricade themselves inside their homes. Thousands of others were seeking a safe haven in neighboring Uzbekistan.

I've been writing about this and warning about this since I visited the Uzbek and Kyrgyz Ferghana in 2003. Terribly sad, but not surprising. I'm sure Stalin is laughing somewhere in Hell.

You'll also notice something about these photos: most of the refugees are women and children. Where are the men and what are they doing?