Is there any other reason why the West should be interested in the welfare of the people of Uzbekistan?
Violence in Uzbekistan will not go unnoticed in Central Asia
By Abu Farhan
The Government of Uzbekistan is conducting a massive crackdown to conceal the truth about the killing of hundreds of civilian demonstrators in Andijan in May, American based Human Rights Watch said in a report released on September 20. The 73-page report provides numerous first-hand testimonies of a brutal police campaign forcing people to confess that they belong to extremist religious organizations, that the protests in Andijan were violent, and that the protesters were armed.
Weve been following political repression in Uzbekistan for many years, but weve never seen anything as extensive as the crackdown post-Andijan, said Holly Cartner, Europe and Central Asia director of Human Rights Watch. Instead of going after the perpetrators of the massacre, the Uzbek government is trying to deny responsibility and silence the witnesses. The report, Burying the Truth: Uzbekistan Rewrites the Story of the Andijan Massacre, details the unrelenting persecution of human rights defenders, independent journalists and political activists who tried to tell the truth about what happened on May 13. At least 11 activists have been imprisoned, at least 15 have been forced to flee the country into exile, and many other civil society activists have been forced to abandon their work.
President Karimovs Government has so far refused to allow any investigation into what happened in Andijan last May, therefore, any kind of transparency of the matter is very uncertain.
Craig Murray, the former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan, has criticised Karimovs regime. He said: Karimov is a ruthless tyrant. He is not interested in the welfare of the people - he is just concerned with maintaining his own power He has done all this with complete US support The attempt by the Uzbek regime and the White House to dismiss the opposition as Islamic extremists and terrorists is despicable.
Karimov has sought to abolish all forms of Islamic dissent by banning their activities or arresting ordinary pious Muslims accusing them of having links with extremists. To date, there has not been any credible evidence available of the involvement of any particular Islamic group in the Andijan uprising. The accused 23 businessmen are the entrepreneurs, Islam-loving Uzbek citizens, with no intention of taking part in overthrowing Karimovs regime. Anyone who opposes Karimovs regime is accused of being an Islamist or terrorist.
Uzbekistan is Central Asias Islamic heartland with historical places like Bukhara, Samarkand and the Ferghana Valley. Apart from Uzbekistan, the Ferghana Valley is shared by another two republics - Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. The Valley has the largest concentration of population in the region and is well-known for its Islamic identity. People in the Valley are mostly involved in trading in the traditional bazâr to make their livelihood.
Karimovs Government also closed down mosques and Islamic schools, which did not seek Government permission to be built, but gained popularity in the community. The Government refuses the permission because it wants to have full control of all Islamic and non-Islamic organizations. They are required to have Government departments affiliation.
Karimovs regime has always been suspicious of foreign and local independent NGOs so much so that even the International Committee of the Red Cross has not been allowed any access after the Andijan violence to offer treatment to the injured people.
A religious organization called Akromiya Movement in Andijan, organized by Akrom Yuldoshev, claims to organize religious activities to benefit the society spiritually and materially. Ordinary people put their trust on such personalities due to their closeness to them. And in private they praise them blaming the Government for harassing them. The businessmen who are involved with the Movement sacrifice part of their earnings in charitable activities for the development of their community by financing orphanages, schools, elderly people and poor families. The Movement denies the allegation that it seeks to establish an Islamic state anywhere in Uzbekistan.
There are several reasons for the uprising. Apart from political repression, the economic mismanagement of the authorities is one of the main reasons for discontent and popular anger. Due to the adverse economic policy, the wealth of the country is handled by only a small number of elite favoured by the regime while the vast majority is deprived of economic prosperity. The above mentioned bazâr traders lately are finding difficult to earn their living due to the several Government restrictions on their trade which lead to their widespread discontent. Many of the traders are women as well.
Uzbekistan is gifted with huge amount of natural wealth. It is one of the ten largest producers of gold in the world and fifth largest cotton producer known as white gold of Central Asia. Despite having natural resources, Uzbekistan remains in World Banks Low Income Country list. Along with Uzbekistan the other Central Asian republics also possess huge oil and gas reserves. But most of these countries suffer from harsh economic inequality, unemployment, housing, health and other basic necessities of life due to the governments corruption and bureaucracy. Their control of the media does not allow the free world to know about their internal affairs. Only through very limited sources one can get the picture of repression, torture of prisoners and their families. They force the prisoners to confess that they are guilty to convince the free world of the Governments stand.
The authorities in the region are apprehensive of the formation of Islamic Movement of Central Asia as they are worried that the Muslim fundamentalists of the region have been working on the creation of a united organization who are still isolated but keep close contacts with each other. It is an undeniable fact that the role of Muslim intelligentsia in these republics cannot be neglected. It is not surprising that peoples from all walks of life, intellectuals and professionals alike - engineers, doctors, scientists, writers, professors, lawyers, have no regrets to be religiously motivated. However, after September 11, the governments in the region have received Americas blessings to fight terrorism and strengthened their hold on to the power and subsequently have been ignoring international pleas for reform.
Said Abdullah Nuri, the Leader of the Islamic Revival Party (IRP) of Tajikistan, the only legal Islamic party in the region, has reiterated that the political role of Islam must not be ignored in Central Asia. He stressed that one should not forget that Islamic tradition is closely related with the national culture of the native people of Central Asia. It is not easy to root out such culture and tradition, which the Soviets tried for long but failed. He suggested that no one should be afraid of Islam, rather it should be respected and find peaceful democratic means of coexistence. It is worth mentioning that the IRP has two members (MPs) in the Tajik Parliament.
It is clear that the government repression in all Central Asian republics is the cause of proliferation of extremist actions by the ordinary citizens. The violence that erupted in Andijan is unlikely to stop or secede, rather very likely to spread in other parts of Central Asia unless the present regimes are prepared to take immediate measures of political and economic reforms. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), created in 1996 with the membership of China, Russia, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan, vowed to ensure security and strategic stability in the region. But, unfortunately, all the SCO members are pretty unfriendly with their sizable Muslim population being afraid of the Islamic revival in their respective countries.
All the Central Asian governments, without exception, justified concentration of power in their own hands, avoid fair elections, refuse to accept peoples verdict, curtail civil rights and repel international criticism. The international community needs to come forward with tangible plans and put substantial pressure on these governments to make commitments to promote multi-party democracy and free society as according to the international standards.
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