Terrorism in Uzbekistan
Encyclopedia
Terrorism in Uzbekistan
is more prevalent than in any other Central Asia
n state. Prior to the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan
the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan
, posed the greatest threat to the Karimov administration. The organization was classified as terrorist by the United States
. Since the invasion the IMU has been greatly weakened due to U.S. military actions which cut off their supply of resources and killed their leader, Juma Namangani.
The largest terrorist attacks were the 1999 Tashkent bombings, IMU invasions of 2000-2001, and Tashkent attacks of March and July 2004.
estimates there are over six thousand Uzbeks in prison for practicing Islam outside of the state-run religious establishment. After visiting Uzbekistan in 2002 the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture found torture and ill-treatment of prisoners to be systematic.
According to HRW, "In addition to hundreds of reports of beatings and numerous accounts of the use of electric shock, temporary suffocation, hanging by the ankles or wrists, removal of fingernails, and punctures with sharp objects, Human Rights Watch received credible reports in 2000 that police sodomized male detainees with bottles, raped them, and beat and burned them in the groin area. Male and female detainees were regularly threatened with rape. Police made such threats in particular against female detainees in the presence of male relatives to force the men to sign self-incriminating statements. Police also regularly threatened to murder detainees or their family members and to place minor children in orphanages. Self-incriminating testimony obtained through torture was routinely admitted by judges, who cited this as evidence, often the only evidence, to convict. Courts did not initiate investigations into allegations of mistreatment by police."
Human rights organizations have detailed the improper "imposition of capital punishment" since Uzbekistan's independence.
, a Canadian
citizen, and Guler Dilaver, an Uyghur
terrorist wanted for terrorism in China and Kyrgyzstan, are the same person. When Uzbek police arrested him he had documentation identifying him as Celil, but the Interpol National Central Bureau in Tashkent supports the Uzbek government's position. The Kyrgyz government wanted Dilaver extradited for his involvement in the March 2000 slaying of Nigmat Baizakov, head of the Uyghur Society in Kyrgyzstan, and the Chinese government wanted him for the May 2000 attack on a state delegation Xingjiang.
exploded in Tashkent
, killing 16 and injuring more than 100, in an attempt to assassinate President Islam Karimov. The IMU was blamed.
airbase
in return for "urgent" bilateral security talks with the United States if Taliban fighters spread fighting north into Uzbekistan. They agreed in a joint statement to "eliminate international terrorism and its infrastructure. For these purposes, the Republic of Uzbekistan has agreed to provide the use of its airspace and necessary military and civilian infrastructure of one of its airports, which would be used in the first instance for humanitarian purposes." A week earlier Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
visited Uzbekistan and met with President
Islam Karimov. Karimov agreed to assist the U.S. in the War on Terror
by lending Karshi-Khanabad for "humanitarian" search and rescue
missions. Taliban officials warned the Uzbek government that they would be attacked if they helped in the U.S. invasion. 1,000 U.S. were sent to Karshi-Khanabad between Rumsfeld's visit and the second agreement of 7 October. At the same time the Taliban sent 10,000 troops to the Afghanistan-Uzbekistan border. An spokesman for the Uzbek Foreign Ministry said, "Concentrating 10,000 troops on the border would be a dangerous tactic for the Taliban, because they would become targets for US bombing raids." State Department spokesman Richard Boucher
said Uzbekistan is "a country that we've worked with for many years in the past to help them with border security, to help them with anti-terrorism efforts and (there are) terrorism and threats coming at them from Afghanistan."
and Hizb ut-Tahrir
may have been involved. Igor Rotar, a journalist and human rights activist for Forum 18
, said "we can only guess as to who is behind the recent terrorist acts in Tashkent – the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Hizb ut-Tahrir, or some other radical Islamic organization." Svante Cornell, an expert on Central Asia at Sweden's Uppsala University, said, "The reigning assumption is that this is a work done by the most prevalent armed opposition to the government, which is the Islamic extremists. [It could be] in the form of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, which has a known track record for armed uprising. It could be linked to international terrorism with Al-Qaeda– which does not exclude the IMU, which was tightly linked to Al-Qaeda. And a third version is that it's a splinter group of Hizb ut-Tahrir, which is a self-avowed peaceful grouping but which has been showing signs of not being as united in Central Asia as in other parts of the world."
in March and April 2004. Gunmen and female suicide bomber
s took part in the attacks, which mainly targeted police. The violence killed 33 militants, 10 policemen, and four civilians. The government blamed Hizb ut-Tahrir
, though the Islamic Jihad Union
(IJU) claimed responsibility.
Furkat Kasimovich Yusupov
was arrested in the first half of 2004, and charged as the leader of a group that had carried out the March 28 bombing on behalf of Hizb ut-Tahrir.
i embassies in Tashkent. Two Uzbek security guards were killed in both bombings. The IJU again claimed responsibility.
, told Uzbek President Islam Karimov that the Uzbek government's actions in quelling unrest in the Uzbek city of Andijan
on 12 and 13 May 2005 helped "protect the peace of 26 million Uzbekistanis. A different outcome would have destabilized the region today." He said that because terrorists had taken over government buildings and prisons, Karimov could not respond differently to the unrest, and other governments had responded similarly in the past. The Uzbek government attributed the unrest to Islamic extremist groups recognized as terrorist organizations in Uzbekistan. The Uzbek government estimated 187 people, made up of 94 terrorists, 60 civilians, 31 policemen, and two others died, and 76 terrorists were injured. Human rights groups dispute the government's estimate, accusing Uzbek security forces of killing about 700 civilians. Ikrom Yakubov, a former major in the Uzbek secret services who defected, alleged that President Karimov himself ordered the troops to fire on the protestors, and that 1,500 were killed. He also claimed that the instigation was a false flag
operation, and that the Uzbek government itself had "propped up" the Islamic group Akramia, whom Uzbek authorities blamed for initiating the incident.
called upon the Kazakh government to refrain from handing over Lutfullo Shamsudinov, the Andijan representative for the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan, then held in Almaty, to the Uzbek government. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
had given Shamsudinov refugee
status and planned to resettle him when Kazakh authorities detained him on 4 July. Earlier that day President Karimov visited Kazakhstan along with other regional nations' representatives as part of a Shanghai Cooperation Organization
meeting. The Uzbek government requested Shamsudinov's extradition
, charging him with five criminal charges including premeditated murder. Holly Cartner, executive director of the Europe and Central Asia division of Human Rights Watch, said, "Kazakhstan should step forward and protect this brave man. Instead of that, the authorities seem ready to hand over a refugee to be tortured, in blatant violation of international law
." In response to statements made by a representative for the Almaty city prosecutor's office, in which the representative called Shamsudinov a terrorist, Cartner said, "The terrorist accusation is a perversion of international concerns about terrorism and an attempt to block international support for Shamsudinov. In reality, he is someone who worked tirelessly towards the rule of law
in Uzbekistan." Russia also deported an asylum seeker to Uzbekistan, Rustam Muminov, and Kyrgyzstan deported five Andijan-refugees - Jahongir Maqsudov, Yoqub Toshboev, Odiljon Rahimov, Rasuljon Pirmatov, and Fayoz Tojihalilov - to Uzbekistan in early August 2006. An Uzbek court later found Muminov, accused of participating in the unrest in Andijan, guilty of membership in Hizb ut-Tahrir and sentenced him on 15 March to five years and six months in prison.
on the border with Uzbekistan on 19 October 2006. The New York Times
reported that the fence will be "eight-foot-high [with] barbed-wire" and searchlights "along heavily populated towns and cities on the southern ridge" where drug smugglers operate. The area is a "flash point in a larger regional struggle against Islamic militants."
The governments of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan first created national border guard forces in 1992 and January 1998 respectively, far earlier than other post-Soviet Union
nations. The Kazakh government raised the force in status, ending the State Security Committee's control until the Committee regained control in 1998.
Other Central Asian nations have had border disputes in the past. Turkmenistan
and Uzbekistan
had serious "issues" regarding their mutual border until May 2004. The Turkmen Foreign Ministry released a statement on 31 May saying disputes had been resolved.
Erik Roslyakov, second in command of Kazakhstan's southern border, said the fence will cover the Sariaghash and Maktaaral districts. Larisa Dmitriyuk, spokeswoman for Kazakhstan's border administration, said the border patrol's "task will now be easier. We will be in a position to use our weapons, as it is the rule when one wants to catch [trespassers]."
In addition to tightening security, Bruce Pannier of Payvand noted increased military spending to strengthen Kazakhstan's border with Uzbekistan and Kyrgystan.
Foreign Relations Committee, gave a speech to the Institute of Strategic and Regional Studies, a think tank run by the Uzbek government, on 13 January 2007. He discussed Pakistan-Uzbekistan relations and counter-terrorism cooperation between both countries, specifically how both countries, as neighbors of Afghanistan could work together to prevent it from becoming a center of terrorism and drug trafficking. Chairman Sayed suggested an annual dialogue between state-run think tanks to discuss counter-terrorism.
President Karimov and Tajik President Imomali Rakhmonov said drug trafficking in Afghanistan needed to be solved by forces within the country on 28 May 2004. Illegal drug traffickers make a total $3.5 billion annually.
Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan , officially the Republic of Uzbekistan is a doubly landlocked country in Central Asia and one of the six independent Turkic states. It shares borders with Kazakhstan to the west and to the north, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the east, and Afghanistan and Turkmenistan to the south....
is more prevalent than in any other Central Asia
Central Asia
Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...
n state. Prior to the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan
War in Afghanistan (2001–present)
The War in Afghanistan began on October 7, 2001, as the armed forces of the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Australia, and the Afghan United Front launched Operation Enduring Freedom...
the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan
Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan
The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan is a militant Islamist group formed in 1991 by the Islamic ideologue Tahir Yuldashev, and former Soviet paratrooper Juma Namangani—both ethnic Uzbeks from the Fergana Valley...
, posed the greatest threat to the Karimov administration. The organization was classified as terrorist by the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. Since the invasion the IMU has been greatly weakened due to U.S. military actions which cut off their supply of resources and killed their leader, Juma Namangani.
The largest terrorist attacks were the 1999 Tashkent bombings, IMU invasions of 2000-2001, and Tashkent attacks of March and July 2004.
State terrorism
Human Rights WatchHuman Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...
estimates there are over six thousand Uzbeks in prison for practicing Islam outside of the state-run religious establishment. After visiting Uzbekistan in 2002 the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture found torture and ill-treatment of prisoners to be systematic.
According to HRW, "In addition to hundreds of reports of beatings and numerous accounts of the use of electric shock, temporary suffocation, hanging by the ankles or wrists, removal of fingernails, and punctures with sharp objects, Human Rights Watch received credible reports in 2000 that police sodomized male detainees with bottles, raped them, and beat and burned them in the groin area. Male and female detainees were regularly threatened with rape. Police made such threats in particular against female detainees in the presence of male relatives to force the men to sign self-incriminating statements. Police also regularly threatened to murder detainees or their family members and to place minor children in orphanages. Self-incriminating testimony obtained through torture was routinely admitted by judges, who cited this as evidence, often the only evidence, to convict. Courts did not initiate investigations into allegations of mistreatment by police."
Human rights organizations have detailed the improper "imposition of capital punishment" since Uzbekistan's independence.
Huseyincan Celil
Uzbek government officials said on 5 May 2006 that evidence proved that Huseyincan CelilHuseyincan Celil
Huseyincan Celil is an Uyghur imam of Chinese and Canadian citizenship. He became the subject of a controversial court case in 2006 when he was arrested in Uzbekistan, extradited to China against the objections of the Canadian government, and sentenced to life in prison on charges of terrorism...
, a Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
citizen, and Guler Dilaver, an Uyghur
Uyghur people
The Uyghur are a Turkic ethnic group living in Eastern and Central Asia. Today, Uyghurs live primarily in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in the People's Republic of China...
terrorist wanted for terrorism in China and Kyrgyzstan, are the same person. When Uzbek police arrested him he had documentation identifying him as Celil, but the Interpol National Central Bureau in Tashkent supports the Uzbek government's position. The Kyrgyz government wanted Dilaver extradited for his involvement in the March 2000 slaying of Nigmat Baizakov, head of the Uyghur Society in Kyrgyzstan, and the Chinese government wanted him for the May 2000 attack on a state delegation Xingjiang.
1999
On February 16, 1999, six bombs1999 Tashkent bombings
The 1999 Tashkent bombings occurred on 16 February when six explosives exploded in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan. The bombs exploded over the course of an hour and a half, and targeted multiple government buildings. Though six explosives were detonated, it is believed that five were a...
exploded in Tashkent
Tashkent
Tashkent is the capital of Uzbekistan and of the Tashkent Province. The officially registered population of the city in 2008 was about 2.2 million. Unofficial sources estimate the actual population may be as much as 4.45 million.-Early Islamic History:...
, killing 16 and injuring more than 100, in an attempt to assassinate President Islam Karimov. The IMU was blamed.
2001
The Uzbek government agreed on 7 October 2001 to allow U.S. troops and planes to use Uzbekistan's airspace and stay at Karshi-KhanabadKarshi-Khanabad
Karshi-Khanabad is an air base in southeastern Uzbekistan, just east of Karshi. It is home to the 60th Separate Mixed Aviation Brigade of the Uzbek Air Force. A section of the base serves as a commercial airport, supporting a limited number of passenger flights.From 1954 to 1981, the 735th Fighter...
airbase
Airbase
An airbase is a military airfield that provides basing and support of military aircraft....
in return for "urgent" bilateral security talks with the United States if Taliban fighters spread fighting north into Uzbekistan. They agreed in a joint statement to "eliminate international terrorism and its infrastructure. For these purposes, the Republic of Uzbekistan has agreed to provide the use of its airspace and necessary military and civilian infrastructure of one of its airports, which would be used in the first instance for humanitarian purposes." A week earlier Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
Donald Rumsfeld
Donald Henry Rumsfeld is an American politician and businessman. Rumsfeld served as the 13th Secretary of Defense from 1975 to 1977 under President Gerald Ford, and as the 21st Secretary of Defense from 2001 to 2006 under President George W. Bush. He is both the youngest and the oldest person to...
visited Uzbekistan and met with President
President of Uzbekistan
President of the Republic of Uzbekistan is the Head of State and executive authority in the Republic of Uzbekistan. The office of President was established in 1991 replacing the position of First secretary of the Communist Party of Uzbekistan that has existed since 1925 while the country was known...
Islam Karimov. Karimov agreed to assist the U.S. in the War on Terror
War on Terror
The War on Terror is a term commonly applied to an international military campaign led by the United States and the United Kingdom with the support of other North Atlantic Treaty Organisation as well as non-NATO countries...
by lending Karshi-Khanabad for "humanitarian" search and rescue
Search and rescue
Search and rescue is the search for and provision of aid to people who are in distress or imminent danger.The general field of search and rescue includes many specialty sub-fields, mostly based upon terrain considerations...
missions. Taliban officials warned the Uzbek government that they would be attacked if they helped in the U.S. invasion. 1,000 U.S. were sent to Karshi-Khanabad between Rumsfeld's visit and the second agreement of 7 October. At the same time the Taliban sent 10,000 troops to the Afghanistan-Uzbekistan border. An spokesman for the Uzbek Foreign Ministry said, "Concentrating 10,000 troops on the border would be a dangerous tactic for the Taliban, because they would become targets for US bombing raids." State Department spokesman Richard Boucher
Richard Boucher
Richard A. Boucher is Deputy Secretary-General of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development . He took up post on 5 November 2009. Prior to joining OECD, he was the Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs, a post he took up on February 21, 2006...
said Uzbekistan is "a country that we've worked with for many years in the past to help them with border security, to help them with anti-terrorism efforts and (there are) terrorism and threats coming at them from Afghanistan."
Aspects of terrorism
Chris Seiple, the President of the Institute for Global Engagement, said in April 2004 that recent terrorist attacks, while planned in advance, were "prematurely implemented with several not taking place" and only targeted Uzbek government officials with suicide bombings. Police consistently acted quickly to remove signs of the attack. Officials from the local police, Interior Ministry, and the National Security Service manned checkpoints at the same time because rival clans, which each runs their own department, do not trust each other. Seiple said the Islamic Movement of UzbekistanIslamic Movement of Uzbekistan
The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan is a militant Islamist group formed in 1991 by the Islamic ideologue Tahir Yuldashev, and former Soviet paratrooper Juma Namangani—both ethnic Uzbeks from the Fergana Valley...
and Hizb ut-Tahrir
Hizb ut-Tahrir
Hizb ut-Tahrir is an international Sunni. pan-Islamic political organisation but keeps it open for all including shias,some of its beliefs are against sunni school of thought, whose goal is for all Muslim countries to unify as an Islamic state or caliphate ruled by Islamic law and with a caliph...
may have been involved. Igor Rotar, a journalist and human rights activist for Forum 18
Forum 18
Forum 18 is a Norwegian human rights organization that promotes religious freedom. The organization's name is based on Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights...
, said "we can only guess as to who is behind the recent terrorist acts in Tashkent – the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Hizb ut-Tahrir, or some other radical Islamic organization." Svante Cornell, an expert on Central Asia at Sweden's Uppsala University, said, "The reigning assumption is that this is a work done by the most prevalent armed opposition to the government, which is the Islamic extremists. [It could be] in the form of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, which has a known track record for armed uprising. It could be linked to international terrorism with Al-Qaeda– which does not exclude the IMU, which was tightly linked to Al-Qaeda. And a third version is that it's a splinter group of Hizb ut-Tahrir, which is a self-avowed peaceful grouping but which has been showing signs of not being as united in Central Asia as in other parts of the world."
March-April violence
The IMU launched a series of attacks in Tashkent and BukharaBukhara
Bukhara , from the Soghdian βuxārak , is the capital of the Bukhara Province of Uzbekistan. The nation's fifth-largest city, it has a population of 263,400 . The region around Bukhara has been inhabited for at least five millennia, and the city has existed for half that time...
in March and April 2004. Gunmen and female suicide bomber
Female suicide bomber
Though the majority of suicide bombers have been male, female suicide bombers have carried out a number of attacks.-History:Female suicide bombers have been employed in several conflicts, by a variety of organizations, against both military and civilian targets.*In Lebanon on April 9, 1985, Sana'a...
s took part in the attacks, which mainly targeted police. The violence killed 33 militants, 10 policemen, and four civilians. The government blamed Hizb ut-Tahrir
Hizb ut-Tahrir
Hizb ut-Tahrir is an international Sunni. pan-Islamic political organisation but keeps it open for all including shias,some of its beliefs are against sunni school of thought, whose goal is for all Muslim countries to unify as an Islamic state or caliphate ruled by Islamic law and with a caliph...
, though the Islamic Jihad Union
Islamic Jihad Union
The Islamic Jihad Union , also known as Islamic Jihad Group , is a terrorist organization which splintered from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan , and has conducted attacks in Uzbekistan and attempted attacks in Germany....
(IJU) claimed responsibility.
Furkat Kasimovich Yusupov
Furkat Kasimovich Yusupov
Furkat Kasimovich Yusupov is a citizen of Uzbekistan who was arrested for, charged with, and tried for terrorism offenses in 2004.Yusupov was described as being the leader of a group that executed a series of terrorist bombings on March 28, 2004....
was arrested in the first half of 2004, and charged as the leader of a group that had carried out the March 28 bombing on behalf of Hizb ut-Tahrir.
Embassy bombings
On July 30, 2004, suicide bombers struck the entrances of the U.S. and IsraelIsrael
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
i embassies in Tashkent. Two Uzbek security guards were killed in both bombings. The IJU again claimed responsibility.
Andijan massacre
Nazarbayev, while on a state visit to UzbekistanUzbekistan
Uzbekistan , officially the Republic of Uzbekistan is a doubly landlocked country in Central Asia and one of the six independent Turkic states. It shares borders with Kazakhstan to the west and to the north, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the east, and Afghanistan and Turkmenistan to the south....
, told Uzbek President Islam Karimov that the Uzbek government's actions in quelling unrest in the Uzbek city of Andijan
Andijan
Andijan or Andizhan is the fourth-largest city in Uzbekistan, and the capital of the Andijan Province. It is located in the east of the country, at , in the Fergana Valley, near the border with Kyrgyzstan on the Andijan-Say River...
on 12 and 13 May 2005 helped "protect the peace of 26 million Uzbekistanis. A different outcome would have destabilized the region today." He said that because terrorists had taken over government buildings and prisons, Karimov could not respond differently to the unrest, and other governments had responded similarly in the past. The Uzbek government attributed the unrest to Islamic extremist groups recognized as terrorist organizations in Uzbekistan. The Uzbek government estimated 187 people, made up of 94 terrorists, 60 civilians, 31 policemen, and two others died, and 76 terrorists were injured. Human rights groups dispute the government's estimate, accusing Uzbek security forces of killing about 700 civilians. Ikrom Yakubov, a former major in the Uzbek secret services who defected, alleged that President Karimov himself ordered the troops to fire on the protestors, and that 1,500 were killed. He also claimed that the instigation was a false flag
False flag
False flag operations are covert operations designed to deceive the public in such a way that the operations appear as though they are being carried out by other entities. The name is derived from the military concept of flying false colors; that is flying the flag of a country other than one's own...
operation, and that the Uzbek government itself had "propped up" the Islamic group Akramia, whom Uzbek authorities blamed for initiating the incident.
Extradition of terrorist suspects
On 5 July 2005 Human Rights WatchHuman Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...
called upon the Kazakh government to refrain from handing over Lutfullo Shamsudinov, the Andijan representative for the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan, then held in Almaty, to the Uzbek government. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees , also known as The UN Refugee Agency is a United Nations agency mandated to protect and support refugees at the request of a government or the UN itself and assists in their voluntary repatriation, local integration or resettlement to...
had given Shamsudinov refugee
Refugee
A refugee is a person who outside her country of origin or habitual residence because she has suffered persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or because she is a member of a persecuted 'social group'. Such a person may be referred to as an 'asylum seeker' until...
status and planned to resettle him when Kazakh authorities detained him on 4 July. Earlier that day President Karimov visited Kazakhstan along with other regional nations' representatives as part of a Shanghai Cooperation Organization
Shanghai Cooperation Organization
The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation or SCO , is an intergovernmental mutual-security organisation which was founded in 2001 in Shanghai by the leaders of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan...
meeting. The Uzbek government requested Shamsudinov's extradition
Extradition
Extradition is the official process whereby one nation or state surrenders a suspected or convicted criminal to another nation or state. Between nation states, extradition is regulated by treaties...
, charging him with five criminal charges including premeditated murder. Holly Cartner, executive director of the Europe and Central Asia division of Human Rights Watch, said, "Kazakhstan should step forward and protect this brave man. Instead of that, the authorities seem ready to hand over a refugee to be tortured, in blatant violation of international law
International law
Public international law concerns the structure and conduct of sovereign states; analogous entities, such as the Holy See; and intergovernmental organizations. To a lesser degree, international law also may affect multinational corporations and individuals, an impact increasingly evolving beyond...
." In response to statements made by a representative for the Almaty city prosecutor's office, in which the representative called Shamsudinov a terrorist, Cartner said, "The terrorist accusation is a perversion of international concerns about terrorism and an attempt to block international support for Shamsudinov. In reality, he is someone who worked tirelessly towards the rule of law
Rule of law
The rule of law, sometimes called supremacy of law, is a legal maxim that says that governmental decisions should be made by applying known principles or laws with minimal discretion in their application...
in Uzbekistan." Russia also deported an asylum seeker to Uzbekistan, Rustam Muminov, and Kyrgyzstan deported five Andijan-refugees - Jahongir Maqsudov, Yoqub Toshboev, Odiljon Rahimov, Rasuljon Pirmatov, and Fayoz Tojihalilov - to Uzbekistan in early August 2006. An Uzbek court later found Muminov, accused of participating in the unrest in Andijan, guilty of membership in Hizb ut-Tahrir and sentenced him on 15 March to five years and six months in prison.
Security fence
Kazakh border officials began building a 28-mile long fenceSeparation barrier
A separation barrier is a wall or fence constructed to limit the movement of people across a certain line or border, or to separate two populations. These structures vary in placement with regard to international borders and topography...
on the border with Uzbekistan on 19 October 2006. The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
reported that the fence will be "eight-foot-high [with] barbed-wire" and searchlights "along heavily populated towns and cities on the southern ridge" where drug smugglers operate. The area is a "flash point in a larger regional struggle against Islamic militants."
The governments of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan first created national border guard forces in 1992 and January 1998 respectively, far earlier than other post-Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
nations. The Kazakh government raised the force in status, ending the State Security Committee's control until the Committee regained control in 1998.
Other Central Asian nations have had border disputes in the past. Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan , formerly also known as Turkmenia is one of the Turkic states in Central Asia. Until 1991, it was a constituent republic of the Soviet Union, the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic . Turkmenistan is one of the six independent Turkic states...
and Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan , officially the Republic of Uzbekistan is a doubly landlocked country in Central Asia and one of the six independent Turkic states. It shares borders with Kazakhstan to the west and to the north, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the east, and Afghanistan and Turkmenistan to the south....
had serious "issues" regarding their mutual border until May 2004. The Turkmen Foreign Ministry released a statement on 31 May saying disputes had been resolved.
Erik Roslyakov, second in command of Kazakhstan's southern border, said the fence will cover the Sariaghash and Maktaaral districts. Larisa Dmitriyuk, spokeswoman for Kazakhstan's border administration, said the border patrol's "task will now be easier. We will be in a position to use our weapons, as it is the rule when one wants to catch [trespassers]."
In addition to tightening security, Bruce Pannier of Payvand noted increased military spending to strengthen Kazakhstan's border with Uzbekistan and Kyrgystan.
Cooperation with Pakistan
Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed, Chairman of the Pakistani Senate'sSenate of Pakistan
The Senate of Pakistan is the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of Pakistan. Elections are held every three years for one half of the senate and each senator has a term of six years...
Foreign Relations Committee, gave a speech to the Institute of Strategic and Regional Studies, a think tank run by the Uzbek government, on 13 January 2007. He discussed Pakistan-Uzbekistan relations and counter-terrorism cooperation between both countries, specifically how both countries, as neighbors of Afghanistan could work together to prevent it from becoming a center of terrorism and drug trafficking. Chairman Sayed suggested an annual dialogue between state-run think tanks to discuss counter-terrorism.
Drug trafficking
Drug trafficking in Central Asia is a major source of funding for terrorist organizations, second only to direct donations of military equipment and financing from state sponsors of terrorism. The Tajik government asked Russia on 15 May 2004 to begin withdrawing some of its 20,000 troops from Tajikistan's border with Afghanistan. The withdrawal of troops concerned the U.S. government because the troop presence helped prevent cross-border drug trafficking.President Karimov and Tajik President Imomali Rakhmonov said drug trafficking in Afghanistan needed to be solved by forces within the country on 28 May 2004. Illegal drug traffickers make a total $3.5 billion annually.