AMERICA AND POLITICAL OPPOSITION IN CENTRAL ASIA
Abstract
Political opposition in all Central Asian countries is still weak: the dissident parties and groups are not strong enough to cope with the state, their opponent, which is omnipotent.1 Late in the 1990s the United States realized that rather than addressing specifically European or Asian tasks, in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan it has to create a certain Eurasian model of its attitude toward their political systems. The threat of international terrorism and Islamic extremism is too real to allow Washington to treat the democratic groups in Central Asia in the same balanced way similar groups in Central and Eastern Europe are treated. Still, the White House is fully aware of the importance of the current situation in Central Asia for continued stability and order the world over
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Talking about the Central Asian republics Brzezinski has pointed out that “the newly independent energy-exporting states are still in the early stages of political consolidation. Their systems are fragile, their political processes arbitrary and their statehood vulnerable” (Zb. Brzezinski, “Hegemonic Quicks and,” The National Interest, Winter 2003/04, p. 14 [http://www.kas.de/upload/dokumente/brzezinski.pdf])
I have excluded from this article the attitude of the American leaders to Central Asian spiritual opposition, the Hizb ut
Tahrir Party, the Wahhabis, etc. in particular.
Within days after 11 September 2001 National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice provided a clear answer: “We are not
going to stop talking about the things that matter to us—human rights and religious freedom and so forth. We’re going to continue
to press those issues” (Country Reports on Human Rights Practices—2003, Released by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights,
and Labor, 25 February 2004 [www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2003/]).
Significantly, in 2004 in many of its documents the U.S. State Department used the blanket term of “activists” and “non
governmental organizations” to describe all opposition groups.
The relative trip to Namangan Assistant Secretary Michael G. Kozak made in November 2004 to meet the leaders of
non-registered opposition groups of Uzbekistan confirmed that Washington is resolved to support political opposition in the
region.
Balans mezhdu voennoy moshch’iu i podderzhkoy prav cheloveka v Tsentral’noy Azii. Diskussia na radio “Svoboda”
(U.S.A.), 2 July 2002 [www.svoboda.org].
On 27 April 2004, speaking at the conference of the U.S. Kazakhstan Business Association in Washington the then
Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage correctly pointed out: “I want to emphasize that the road to a viable, independent state with long-term prosperity and political stability does not run through ‘managed democracy’.” (“Kazakhstan Can Be a Positive Role Model,” R. Armitage Says. Remarks at U.S.-Kazakhstan Business Association Conference, 27 April 2004 [usinfo.state.gov.]).
Here I want to quote an outstanding Uzbek and Tajik philosopher Abdurrauf Fitrat (1886-1938) killed by the Stalin re
gime. Back in 1917 he said that democracy needed no management—it itself should manage society
See excerpts from a report “Supporting Human Rights and Democracy: The U.S. Record 2003-2004 Report. Richard L. Armitage, Deputy Secretary of State, Remarks at the Rollout of Report,” Washington, D.C., 17 May 2004 [www.state.gov/s/d/rm/32521.htm].
On 18 April 2000, the Kazakhstanskaia Pravda wrote about the visit of U.S. State Secretary Madeleine Albright and
noted that the local opposition had had to meet one of the top U.S. officials “late at night and without journalists.” The newspaper concluded
that judging by the subjects discussed “America was more interested in possible variants of its relations with Russia, that has just acquired a new president (Putin. —B.E.), then in the problems of opposition.”
In 2003 fiscal year the United States contributed $13.9 million to democratic developments in Kazakhstan, $7.5 million in Tajikistan, etc.
The program of action formulated by two groups (Birlik and Erk, headed by T. Yoldosh) acting in Uzbekistan is a relevant example. Its economic part demanded that poverty be liquidated, the problem of illegal labor migration addressed, and local producers protected, etc. Their claim to part of the Caspian oil, however, can be described as highly debatable.
Introduction of bills and joint resolutions— (Senate—January 14, —2003) [thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?r108:24:./temp/~r108BpwrDX].
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