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Uzbekistan Unbound
By Ari Berman
05/19/05 "The
Nation" - - "Such people must be shot
in the forehead," Uzbekistan dictator Islam Karimov once
said of political dissidents. "If necessary, I'll shoot them
myself." When not personally gunning down his opposition,
Karimov keeps busy by instructing his security forces to boil,
rape or asphyxiate political prisoners.
Luckily for Karimov, he's a key US
ally in the war on terror. The brutal events of last week only
confirmed that awful reality. For months the Uzbek government had
incarcerated 23 businessmen in the eastern city of Andijan on
trumped-up charges of supporting an obscure Islamist group. Last
week, militants stormed the prison and freed the prisoners. When
thousands of demonstrators, emboldened by the jail break,
assembled in Andijan's town square to protest their country's
climate of repression, corruption and poverty, Karimov travelled
to the city and instructed his soldiers to open
fire on the crowd. Violence soon spread to the border with
Kyrgyzstan, as soldiers allegedly targeted women
and children. Anywhere from a few hundred to 745 people are
reported dead.
The Bush Administration's response
to the butchery was both comical and sad. "We have some
concerns about human rights in Uzbekistan, but we are concerned
about the outbreak of violence, particularly by some members of a
terrorist group freed from prison," Scott McClellan said.
"The people of Uzbekistan want to see more representative and
democratic government, but that should come through peaceful
means, not through violence."
How peaceful change will occur when the US has supplied Karimov
with $500 million in military aid and waived human
rights requirements for military and non-proliferation
assistance is anyone's guess. Shortly after 9/11, Uzbekistan
granted the US a crucial air base to use for the war in
Afghanistan.
The Bush Administration then began funneling $79 in aid to Uzbek
security forces at the same time the State Department was
condemning "torture as a routine investigation
technique." When Colin Powell tried to cut off $18 million in
additional aid for the security forces, General Richard Myers protested,
and forced Powell to restore $7 million.
And just two weeks ago, the New York Times reported that
the CIA had sent at least a dozen suspected terrorists to
Uzbekistan for interrogation via a secret
rendition program. "In my view, we shouldn't let any
single issue drive a relationship with any single county,"
Myers said, dismissing human rights concerns. "It doesn't
seem to be good policy to me."
Meanwhile, on a recent trip to Europe, Bush appeared even more
divorced from reality than usual. "We will not repeat the
mistakes of other generations, appeasing
or excusing tyranny, and sacrificing freedom in the vain
pursuit of stability," he said in Latvia. Then again, this is
the man who once told the New Yorker, "No president
has ever done more for human
rights than I have."
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