[The
flight of many Uzbek business people and the seizure of Uzbek-owned businesses
have sharply diminished the minority’s once important role in the economy. The
sense of physical and social isolation is breeding a quiet, inchoate anger
among all segments of the community – not just the youth, who could be expected
to respond more viscerally to the situation, but also among the Uzbek elite and
middle class. This is increased by an acute awareness that they have nowhere to
go. Neither Russia, with its widespread anti-Central Asian sentiments, nor
Uzbekistan with its harshly autocratic regime, offers an attractive
alternative. While Uzbeks are far from embracing violence and have no
acknowledged leaders, their conversations are turning to retribution, or
failing that a final lashing out at their perceived oppressors.]
EXECUTIVE
SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS
The
nationalist discourse that emerged after the Osh violence unnerved the interim
government that had replaced President Kurmanbek Bakiyev in April 2010. Until
the end of its term in late 2011, it was largely ignored, and sometimes openly
defied, by Osh Mayor Melis Myrzakmatov, the standard-bearer of an ethnic
Kyrgyz-first policy and the most successful radical nationalist leader to
emerge after the killings. This did not change when President Almazbek Atambayev,
a northerner, took office in December 2011. Senior members of his
administration express dismay at tensions in the south but say they have no way
of influencing the situation there.
Uzbeks
are increasingly withdrawing into themselves. They say they are marginalised by
the Kyrgyz majority, forced out of public life and the professions; most
Uzbek-language media have been closed; and prominent nationalists often refer
to them as a diaspora, emphasising their separate and subordinate status. International
organisations report continuing persecution of Uzbeks by a rapaciously corrupt
police and prosecutorial system, almost certainly with the southern
authorities’ tacit approval.
The
flight of many Uzbek business people and the seizure of Uzbek-owned businesses
have sharply diminished the minority’s once important role in the economy. The
sense of physical and social isolation is breeding a quiet, inchoate anger
among all segments of the community – not just the youth, who could be expected
to respond more viscerally to the situation, but also among the Uzbek elite and
middle class. This is increased by an acute awareness that they have nowhere to
go. Neither Russia, with its widespread anti-Central Asian sentiments, nor
Uzbekistan with its harshly autocratic regime, offers an attractive
alternative. While Uzbeks are far from embracing violence and have no
acknowledged leaders, their conversations are turning to retribution, or
failing that a final lashing out at their perceived oppressors.
The
views of southern Kyrgyz have also hardened since the violence. Many feel that
Uzbeks brought disaster on themselves with an ill-advised power grab in June
2010. This version of history has not been proven; it is privately doubted even
by some senior Kyrgyz politicians, but hardly ever challenged by them.
Myrzakmatov enjoys considerable approval among broad segments of southern
Kyrgyz society – including among the younger, better educated and urbanised
social groups that might have been expected to take a more liberal and
conciliatory position.
Ominously,
he re-stated and strengthened his tough anti-Uzbek approach in late 2011 in a
book on the June 2010 violence. Depicting Uzbeks as an essentially separatist
force that threatens Kyrgyzstan’s survival, he stressed the need for non-Kyrgyz
ethnic groups to understand their future role would be as subordinates.
Government
claims that after the June 2010 pogrom, several hundred young Uzbeks from Osh
and other parts of the south went to northern Afghanistan and southern Waziristan
(Pakistan) for military training with the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU)
and other radical Islamist groups have further raised tensions. A series of
high-profile police raids and clashes have added to suspicions. The risk of
radicalisation certainly exists, and there are indications that Islamist groups
have benefited from the aftermath of June 2010. Some young Uzbeks undoubtedly
did leave for military training, and a few may have returned, but the true
number of post-June recruits is almost certainly a fraction of the official
figure.
In all
probability the one radical Islamist movement that publicly rejects violence,
Hizb ut-Tahrir, has benefited most: its articulate proselytisers sound even
more convincing to people who feel threatened. Central Asian Islamists fighting
in Afghanistan, on the other hand, have so far shown little interest or
capacity to extend major operations to Central Asia. Repression and
marginalisation of Uzbeks and other minorities in the south will not cause
radical Islamist violence in the near future but can ensure that radical forces
have a more welcoming operational environment. More importantly, the steady
exclusion of Uzbeks from all walks of life risks creating a dangerous
predisposition to violence: the feeling that the only means of redress left are
illegal ones.
In the
meantime, nationalist leaders in the south seem to be confusing silence with
success. The lack of clear leadership within the Uzbek community may slow the
development of protest, but might also heighten volatility and
unpredictability. It seems unlikely that even the most determined ethnic
nationalist can keep the Uzbek population silenced forever. The 2009 census
showed Uzbeks to have almost equal numbers with Kyrgyz in Osh city and to be a
substantial minority in the two main southern regions. The central government’s
failure to act on the situation is allowing nationalists to set and implement
an exclusionist agenda. The longer it waits, the harder it will be to reverse
the situation.
There
are signs that the central government is once again looking for ways to remove
Myrzakmatov. Previous efforts have failed, and simply changing one person is
not, alone, a solution. The situation can almost certainly be turned around,
but it will require assertive and long-term efforts by Bishkek to reassert its
power in the south and strong, visible support from the international
community. Neither is currently apparent.
RECOMMENDATIONS
To the
Government of Kyrgyzstan:
1.
Appoint or restore qualified Uzbeks to positions in local administration,
education, the judiciary, police and other key areas of government,
particularly in areas where there is a substantial Uzbek minority; and make
reintegration of the police, currently almost exclusively ethnic Kyrgyz, an urgent
priority.
2.
Reopen major Uzbek-language media closed after June 2010. Senior government
figures should use these outlets to reach out to Uzbek citizens.
3.
Carry out infrastructure improvements to roads, water and electricity supplies,
playgrounds and sports facilities in Uzbek communities, where such features are
often considerably below standard.
4.
Extend the anti-corruption campaign explicitly to Uzbek areas, where the
population is at particular risk from abusive officials.
5.
Support and reinforce measures undertaken by the current prosecutor-general to
eradicate the use of torture by police and security bodies; place the temporary
detention facilities (IVS), where most torture takes place, under the justice
ministry; enforce rigorously the prohibition of confessions obtained by
torture; give defence lawyers adequate security; and make regular rotation of
senior police and security officials the norm, in an effort to reduce abuse and
corruption. Implement recommendations of the Special Rapporteur on torture, in
particular:
a) amend the criminal code to define torture as a serious crime
in accordance with Article 1 of the UN Convention against Torture;
b)
ensure in the Law on Amnesty that no person convicted for the crime of torture
will qualify for amnesty;
c)
ensure that legislation concerning evidence presented in judicial proceedings
is brought into line with Article 15 of the UN Convention against Torture in
order to exclude explicitly any evidence or extrajudicial statement obtained
under duress; and
d) make police station chiefs and investigating and operational
officers criminally accountable for any unacknowledged detention.
6.
Repudiate publicly nationalist rhetoric that asserts the supremacy of ethnic
Kyrgyz and reaffirm Kyrgyzstan’s status as a multi-ethnic state in which all
groups enjoy equal rights.
To the
International Community:
7.
Give energetic, long-term and consistent attention to this problem, including
in the following ways:
a) make support for efforts to reduce ethnic tensions in the
south the central focus of operations in Kyrgyzstan;
b)
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon should follow-up on his declarations that UN
operations in southern Kyrgyzstan after the violence were a success by calling
for a truly inclusive political process and an end to impunity, making these
demands the priority for the UN agencies working in Kyrgyzstan.
c)
international organisations and donors should actively encourage central
government efforts to alleviate tension and restore government political
control in the south, making these benchmarks for future economic assistance,
and in the meantime avoid funding any programs that might benefit, directly or
indirectly, the nationalist exclusionist agenda;
d)
international organisations and foreign governments should make clear to Osh
Mayor Myrzakmatov and other key nationalist leaders that discriminatory
policies towards Kyrgyzstan’s minorities will not only damage the country’s –
and Osh’s – international standing, but also their access to international
funding; and
e) international organisations should stagger their staff
rotations in the south, ensuring the presence of a constant core of senior
representatives with an institutional memory of the 2010 violence and
subsequent political developments, in order to be able to better evaluate the
development of the situation on the ground and the statements made by both
official and unofficial political players.