Aronite thinking

Long-drawn-out Jihad in Kyrgyzstan

Islamists and Al-Qaida behind the Nano- Genocide and ethnic cleansing in Kyrgyzstan? American Base- the Reason for Islamists’ destabilising the regime – helped by Russian short sightedness?

Islamists and Al-Qaida behind the Nano- Genocide and ethnic cleansing in Kyrgyzstan? American Base- the Reason for Islamists’ destabilising the regime – helped by Russian short sightedness?

“With proper constitutional amendments and Kyrgyzstan’s new political path towards a parliamentary republic, it is very possible that, gradually, some political party will be established that will attract people based on moral and religious principles,” said a member of Tabligh Jamaat, one of the largest international Islamic movements in Kyrgyzstan, speaking on condition of anonymity.

He downplayed the radical Islamic threat by pointing to the existence of moderate, religious-oriented parties elsewhere, including the Justice and Development Party in Turkey and the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan.

It is hence clear that the Tabliq Jamaat has been moving in that direction ever since the Islamists gained ascendancy in Tajikistan.

Imams have been pushing the Kyrgyz further near radicalization-

Also speaking on condition of anonymity, an imam at a Bishkek mosque said he would like to see politics and politicians grow closer to Islam. His fear, however, is that politicians would manipulate faith in order to pursue their own ends. “Though we do not have legal structures for religious political parties, it would be great to have religion in Kyrgyzstan as a core of moral values and principles in our politicians,” the imam said.

Kyrgyzstan's state-run Muftiyat – a board of Islamic clergy governing all official mosques throughout the country – has supported Osmonaliev's position. “The level of education and preparedness for political activity among believers is inadequate to match contemporary challenges,” said Loma Yusur, an advisor to the Muftiyat.

Simultaneously, he recognized that “Muslims are also citizens and a part of the electorate. Thus, in order to protect the interests of electorate, it should be written in the constitution that a majority of the population is Muslim,” he told EurasiaNet.org.

In other words declare formally the Islamic State.

Political observers have sidelined this Islamist movement and have been reading the current ethnic and civil strife that is turning rapidly into a collapsed State ripe for pick up by Islamists- in isolation.

“Political parties in Kyrgyzstan, both in opposition and in power, are ideologically colorless. That's why the political elite plays up [the threat of radical influence from] Afghanistan to intimidate the population from accepting an ideological religious party. Secondly, Muslims are not ready for public and political activity. There are not many educated lawyers, politicians and economists among Muslims,” he said. “I am afraid that if an Islamic party was created today, it would hurt the perception of religious parties.”

Still, Malikov believes the state must create an official place for sincere discourse with believers. “Such a political platform and dialogue between the state and Islam will [help] avoid extremism,” he concluded.

In Researching Violently Divided Societies Marie Smyth and Gillian Robinson point out how-It Is difficult to pin because of the neutrality of the observer and writer of

the Report- that strengthens the need towards conflict resolution laying less emphasis on Media and activists’ coverage and instead towards addressing the ground reality first hand through the affected people at a local level.

But this should not rest with activism that has its own narrative of the conflict.

To this we might and the insight of Ideologies and actors involved at the macro-level- and nowhere is this clear than in the gross injustice done to the Kashmiri Hindu minorities- by the ethnic cleansing by Islamists.

The April Jihad-

Bakiyev was a hugely unpopular leader with the Islamists.

His image as a surrogate of American central Asian hegemony- among Leftists and Islamists lead to the April unrest and the toppling of his regime.

Most saw this as Revolution- of Democracy displacing autocracy.

The interim regime was only a stop gap and the American Base had to go.

The Jihad kept simmering and the unrest took the form of a stormy uprising.

The Tabliq fingerprints are everywhere-

The chopped fingers and mutilation of the bodies of the victims are being hosted in YouTube- and fit the Jihadi prescription.

The brutality had surprised even the Uzbeks who had a different take on Islam and we can hear them in the YouTube astonished- asking “How is this brutality to us possible?

The Kyrgs are supposed to be Muslims- how can they inflict this on fellow Muslims?”

Behind the roots of the Ethnic strife -

The Uzbeks constitute around 13 % of Kazakhstan’s population –concentrated mostly in the South West province of Osh, in urban enclaves especially in and around the city of Osh.

They have also displaced the Kazaks from the countryside –

The Kazak youth who couldn’t find employment poured into the cities and in Osh- turned into criminal gangs.

While the Uzbeks started a Separatist Adalat- movement, demanding more land , autonomy and

separation and integration into Uzbekistan-

Not very different from the Kashmiri Separatist line clamoring for annexation with Pak-held Kashmir-

The Kazaks would form the Osh-Aimagy or Our-Land movement.

Later the Leftists would spearhead the Democratic Movement the DDK.

Uzbeks ran collective farms in the fag end of Soviet days and when the Uzbek city council wanted to build a cotton- mill there in the outskirts of Osh- this would be seen as a land grab by Uzbeks- who would spark a violent Riot.

Osh riots (1990)

On June 4, 1990, Kyrgyz and Uzbeks gathered on a disputed plot of land, and the local militia used deadly force to disperse the crowds.[4] Local disputes over land control led to widespread ethnic fighting. Uzbeks were attacked in Osh. Rioting also started in Uzgen and neighboring rural localities.[4]

This worst communal flare in June 1990 would result in the rise of the DDK- a coalition of broadly Leftist

Kyrgs-activists.

The DDK would first press for the elimination of the Communist apparatus.

Then they would start tilting towards an Islamic identity- like the Iranian revolution- demand for the constitution of an Apex- Kuraltai- the elder’s council.

The Communist elite would fish in these troubled waters re-launching the Communist movement as CPK.

Joseph Stalin had foreseen this Islamist-ethnic undercurrent and had dispersed the Kyrgs into three enclaves within Kyrgyzstan, and the rest inside today’s Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan.

The five Central Asian republics however, are culturally linked to China’s Xingjiang autonomous region.

This region could become a hotbed of Islamist Separatism and seeks to usher in a Mullacracy.

Russia refuses to intervene this time-

Thousands of ethnic Uzbeks have massed at the Kyrgyz-Uzbek border as they try to escape city of Osh, in which 77 people have

been killed.

The 150 Russian soldiers based near the Kyrgyz capital had been given no instruction to intervene; Russian media quoted an unnamed senior military source as saying.

People are brutally being lynched and children crushed to death.

The violence is the worst to hit the Central Asian country since President Kurmanbek Bakiyev was overthrown in April- and the streets ablaze -reports the BBC.

Entire streets are burning, and thousands have gate crashed the border at Uzbekistan.

"The situation is very bad. There is no sign of it stopping. Homes have been set ablaze... Entire streets are on fire," said Interior Ministry spokesman Rakhmatillo Akhmedov.

Reports suggest the borders to China and Tajikistan have been closed down and a major human disaster is unfolding.

People are being shot down by militias and bodies are lying unrecovered in the streets and homes that are burning.

Thwarting June 27th Referendum the aim of Rioters?

Ms Otunbayeva who heads this interim post-coup regime –

has blamed supporters of Mr Bakiyev for inciting the violence to destabilise the country ahead of the referendum.

Democratic Change- It's Not concluded then Borut Grgic in his Op-ed at the New York times -about the April regime change-

Getting to the bottom of what happened in Kyrgyzstan is key if Europe and the United States wish to bring stability and tranform Kyrgyzstan and the region over the long run.

Let me first address what didn’t happen. For one, a democratic change didn’t take place.

The interim government came to power on the backs of a handful of bandits and supporters with access to weapons. This is very similar to what happened in 2005 when Mr. Bakiyev came to power flanked by

robber barons on horseback from the South.

We (including the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, which I was advising) made the mistake in 2005 of calling the events a democratic change. They weren’t. Mr. Bakiyev made it his priority to enrich himself, his sons and his extended family, spreading the wealth along the South at the expense of the North. The result was a deeper north-south divide that finally led to the coup against him.

He precisely points to invisible actors behind the staged coup-

The events in April didn’t take place without the support of external powers, namely Russia.

Since coming to power, the new interim leaders have traveled to Moscow several times; no visits have been arranged to European capitals, to the United States or to China. It is also hard to ignore the fact that the Russian presence and influence across the new Kyrgyz governing elite is omnipresent.

He also makes us understand the economics-

About 70 percent of the Kyrgyz economy rests on reselling goods from China to Kazakhstan, taking advantage of Kyrgyzstan’s status with the World Trade Organization, to which Kazakhstan doesn’t belong. This allows the Kyrgyz to import at lower

tariffs than what they charge on export. This, to say the least, is not a sustainable economy.

And almost comes in the vicinity of discovering the presence of more important Orchestrators- almost that is.

The majority of Kyrgyz banks are in Kazakh hands, and the Kazakhs are the biggest real estate investors in Kyrgyzstan. The notion that Kyrgyzstan can define its own course, and bring about regional change is thus dangerously naïve. How will Bishkek cover the income gap if Kazakhstan keeps the border closed? Who will make up for the Chinese imports?

We (including the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, which I was advising) made the mistake in 2005 of calling the events a democratic change. They weren’t. Mr. Bakiyev made it his priority to enrich himself, his sons and his extended family, spreading the wealth along the South at the expense of the North. The result was a deeper north-south divide that finally led to the coup against him.

To hope that Kyrgys on their own course, bring about regional change is thus dangerously naïve he quips-

How will Bishkek cover the income gap if Kazakhstan keeps the border closed? Who will

make up for the Chinese imports?

However, he misses out completely any Kazak based Islamist engineering of this Jihad in stages-and fails to consider the Tajik Islamists with deep pockets and the Saudi and Iranian connection.

Bakiyev Supporters Call for Dividing Kyrgyzstan

According to some sources, unknown groups within the southern Kyrgyzstan region of Osh are distributing CDs and pamphlets calling for the division of the country into two parts, creating the new Southern Democratic Kyrgyzstan.

More than five thousand CDs with speeches from ex-president Kurmanbek Bakiyev are being distributed in the highly populated southern cities of Osh, Kara-So, and Alai.

The referendum is seen by Kyrgs as an attempt to vivisect the nation in favour of the Uzbeks.

This also explains wide spread reports of participation of the Para-military in armoured cars doing the shootings indiscriminately in Osh which is an Uzbek

area.

Kyrgyz TV reported that the country's borders with Tajikistan and China have been closed because of the unrest.

April Uprising- still simmering embers of ethnic hate and Separatism flares up now-

The penultimate goal of the Islamists in half a shake can be made out at this point- a Pan-Central Asian Kazak Islamist zone.

The Uzbeks may be seen by them as not playing ball with this- or there might be deeper reasons for their right now being deemed kafirs and treated as such.

The vivisection can be one reason apart from affiliation with an opposed sectarianism.

The April uprising was thus at one go, aimed at removing all political element as well as segments of society that came to be seen as impediments to the realization.

It is also clear that that Islamists have worked out their Jihad very thoroughly, seen that they had the means for this mobilization as well as complacence if not active

participation of significant sections of Armed forces and Party elements.

The immediate trigger for the flare-up would be very disproportional to the Jihadi show.

The outbreak of the violence may have been caused by rumors of the rape and murder of several Uzbek students in a dormitory of the Osh State University.[6]

According to another version, on the night of 10 June Uzbeks at a disco killed Kyrgyz.[7]

According to a third version, a fight between Uzbeks and Kyrgyz began near the town mosque.[8]

Earlier in the day the unrest began (10 June) it was reported that Kyrgyz traders had not visited market and had not opened trade in their marketplaces in Osh [9]

Between 9 and 10 June 2010, rioting in the city of Osh between Kyrgyz and the Uzbek minority population resulted in the deaths of at least 46 people and a further 637 being wounded, many seriously. Gunfire was reported throughout the day in the southern cities and a state of emergency was declared, resulting in the deployment of military units to restore law and order.[10]

On 12 June, Kyrgyzstan's interim government asked Russia to help quell ethnic fighting; claiming the army and police had lost control. Moscow said it cannot get involved at this stage, because the crisis is an internal affair of Kyrgyzstan.[11] Thousands of ethnic Uzbeks are

trying to cross into Uzbekistan, with an official toll of at least 30,000 trying to cross. One source places this figure as high as 75,000.[12] One child was crushed to death at the border. The death toll climbed to 77 with another 1,000 injured. Human rights groups claim the casualty numbers may be much higher as ethnic Uzbek are too scared to seek hospital treatment. Violence also was reported in Jalal-Abad where a university was burned, a police station attacked and several military weapons were stolen by rioters, as was an armored vehicle.[13]

Uzbek refugees claim that people are being shot at from armored personnel carriers, which are making way for armed gangs of ethnic Kyrgyz.[14]

Kyrgyz interim government passed a decree declaring a partial mobilization of the civilian reservists. On 13 June, Kyrgyz recruitment offices are scheduled to start to register the reservists.[15]

By the 12 June, the official death toll stood at 100, with more than 1000 injured.[16]

Unofficial sources claim more than 1000 ("thousands") killed, several thousands wounded and tens of thousands refugees.[17] [18] [19] these figures are higher than official data as authorities count only those who died in hospitals [20] [21]. According to sources of Uzbek community, at least 700 Uzbeks were killed in Jalal-Abad where clashes were less intense than in Osh [22].

The killings were performed with fearsome cruelty - many victims were raped and burned alive.[23][24][25] Armed gangs were trying to prevent wounded to receive any first aid, in Jalal-Abad the crowd attacked the hospital where wounded received treatment[26]. The out rest and violence were possible with neglecting from local police and military and even, according to some sources [27] local military took active part in ethnic clashes and looting. At least five policemen were reported to be killed during the clashes [28]

The International Committee of the Red Cross expressed its deep concern about the worsening humanitarian situation and called on the Kyrgyz authorities to do everything in their power to protect their citizens, restore order and ensure respect for the rule of law.

U.S.Military Base critical for Afghan operation-

300 kames from Osh is an American Base.

This is a very strategically crucial station for American and allied operations in Afghanistan.

Russia has resented this U.S presence since the collapse of the Soviet Union and is refusing to intervene in the matter.

This could be a factor the Al Qaida could exploit to get a regime change engineered through brutal means.

Mr Bakiyev fled with his family to Belarus after violent clashes between government forces and protesters on 7 April.

The fledgling government has left the country at the mercy of marauding hordes- who are freely implementing the ethnic cleansing.

Whatever emerges would most likely see the weakening of the U.S presence there and an invitation for more Russian intervention.

Russia might pretend top reluctantly enter and consolidate its grip and pave the way for the exit of the Americans.

An Al-Qaida hand in the whole brutal upheaval is thus quite in line of their expectations.

In the long run, this is not in the best interests of Russia given the Islamic extremism that could get

a big boost once Central Asia gets into their hands- and that would only see more bombs being set off inside Russian Metros by the Chechens.

The American leadership paralysed-

Though having its crucial Base situated so close to the epicentre of this Islamist Quake- America is held down from an active intervention to doze out the fires, because of its muddled thinking.

It is considering all things that the Al-Qaeda had mastered at weighing its enemies –‘we are testing you”

They know well how Russia will be react typically and how the U.S would stand paralysed.

What is right now emerging there is an Islamic revolution that will complete the one started in Teheran- ironically at a time it is collapsing.

This Central Asian Talibanistan will have far reaching and dramatic impact on the fortunes all involved-

Russia, American alliance, India and even Israel.

Each is displaying a complete lack of foresight that they might sooner than later regret.

All they seem to see in the most disturbing pictures coming out from Kirgizstan is at best these lines with pathos-

So before I was nine I had known the basic canon of the Arab life. It was me against my brother, me and my brother against my father, my family against my cousins and my clan; the clan against my tribe; and the tribe against the world. And all of us against the Infidel.

LEON URIS in The Haj