In line with the Russia talk last night, take time to read this report, the balance is on site, as it is not willing to be reprinted.
granny
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ice Attempts to Secure U.S. Influence in Central Asia
Drafted By: Erich Marquardt, Adam Wolfe
http://www.pinr.com
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's October 10-13 tour
through Central Asia marked Washington's attempts to secure its
ties with the former Soviet republics. The Bush administration
finds these ties especially important now that it is being evicted
from its military base in Uzbekistan. Relations between the
United States and Uzbekistan have weakened recently; indeed,
while the trip saw Rice visiting Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and
Tajikistan, she did not visit Uzbekistan.
Instead, Rice called Uzbekistan "out of step with what is
happening in [Central Asia] as a whole." Her comments close the
recent chapter of U.S.-Uzbek relations. With the loss of the U.S.
military base in Uzbekistan, the United States has moved quickly
to prevent a further loss of influence in Central Asia. With the
recent announcement by Kyrgyzstan that the U.S. could keep its
airbase at Manas airport, Washington appears to be partly
successful in this aim. However, if conditions in Afghanistan
stabilize, calls for a U.S. withdrawal from Central Asia are
expected to increase.
Washington's Loss of Uzbekistan
Following the September 11, 2001 attacks, Tashkent offered
Washington the use of the Karshi-Khanabad airbase in
southeastern Uzbekistan. U.S.-Uzbek relations were at a high
point, a development that distressed the Russian Federation
since it saw its former Cold War enemy encroaching on its
traditional sphere of influence. Moreover, not only did the United
States secure military base rights in Uzbekistan, but it also
secured base rights at the Manas airbase in Kyrgyzstan, another
former Soviet republic. Russia could do little to prevent U.S.
involvement in these countries.
However, once the invasion of Afghanistan was over and the
country began to stabilize, policymakers in Washington began to
second guess having positive relations with states that could
easily become unstable due to their authoritarian rule and
repression of opposition movements. As stated by PINR analyst
Dr. Michael A. Weinstein in September 2005, consensus was
finally reached in Washington "that Uzbekistan's authoritarian
regime led by President Islam Karimov is not stable in the long
run, that it should be pressured on its human rights violations
and that opposition to it should be nurtured." Therefore, in 2004
the U.S. canceled aid to Uzbekistan ostensibly due to its poor
human rights record. [See: "Intelligence Brief:
Uzbekistan-C.I.S."]
The cancellation of aid combined with the March 2005 revolution
that overthrew Kyrgyzstan's authoritarian government caused
obvious concern in Tashkent since it too faced revolutionary
forces. Tashkent deduced that while there were many benefits to
further cooperation with the United States, there was also the
risk that growing U.S. involvement in Uzbekistan could
destabilize Karimov's authoritarian government.
The catalyst occurred when Karimov suppressed a rebellion in
the city of Andijan on May 13, 2005. The United States joined the
European Union in calling for an independent investigation of the
incident. Moscow, however, stood with Tashkent. A little more
than a month after the protests, Tashkent restricted U.S. flights
out of Karshi-Khanabad. Then, on July 29, Tashkent chose to
evict the United States from the base altogether, giving it a
January 2006 eviction ultimatum. To retaliate, in early October
the U.S. Senate voted to block payment of US$23 million owed to
Uzbekistan for the Pentagon's past use of the base. [See:
"Intelligence Brief: Uzbekistan-C.I.S."]
Now, both the U.S. and Uzbekistan have hardened their
respective positions, and it appears that relations between the
two states will not improve for the foreseeable future. Rice
exempted Uzbekistan from her October visit to the region, and
Uzbekistan just conducted joint war games with Russia. Tashkent
has also been speaking more positively about its relations with
Moscow.
Moscow, of course, is happy to see Uzbekistan back in its court,
and will pursue a policy that keeps Karimov in control of
Uzbekistan and on Russia's side in the struggle for influence in
Central Asia. Indeed, after the recent Russian-Uzbek war games,
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov told journalists, "These
should not be the only Russian-Uzbek exercises. These joint
military exercises should be conducted regularly, and made an
integral part of our military cooperation." Russian Foreign
Minister Sergei Lavrov offered stability assurances of his own,
rebuking the European Union for placing sanctions on
Uzbekistan, saying that they would have little effect, calling the
sanctions a "purely political instrument which has shown its lack
of effectiveness in Iraq and other regions."
U.S. Secures Use of Manas Airbase in Kyrgyzstan