Yankee Ketsin! | Bishkek’s Airbases

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Both of Kyrgyzstan’s airbases got plenty of newsplay today, neatly coinciding with a visit today from the CSTO Secretary General Nikolai Bordyuzha. Most of the news agencies make much of the ‘working visit,’ which follows Kyrgyz Parliament Speaker Marat Sultanov’s mission to Moscow last week where he plead for more CSTO forces to help guard Kyrgyzstan’s borders.

“If the Kant base is enlarged, the security of our airspace and our state borders will be ensured, and [the need for] further operations at the Manas base, which provides air support to international antiterrorism coalition troops in Afghanistan, could be discussed,” Sultanov said.

Akipress notably was the only news-service today that reported Bordyuzha’s chiding rejection, while Kabar, the Kyrgyz state news agency, is probably the most misleading.

“And I, as someone who deals with the protection of borders, I think that time is over. Kyrgyzstan is a sovereign state which has fully formed [military] departments, including border guards.”

Of course, any of that could change given what’s in it for Russia further down the line. Meanwhile, the newly established ‘Movement for the Withdrawal of the American Air Force Base’ declared today that it would hold rallies in front of the US Embassy in Bishkek and the Ganci airbase, starting June 2. Mostly backed by the Communist Party of Kyrgyzstan for now, the Movement’s objectives include: informing citizens of the negative consequences of hosting the base, opening detailed negotiations aimed at withdrawal, and proper compensation for the widow of the Kyrgyz-citizen, Alexander Ivanov, who was shot at a Ganci checkpoint. Recently having been offered a token US $50 thousand, widow Marina Ivanova strongly supports the anti-base movement, which she expresses here:

America shouts about their democratic rights which it imposes everywhere, but today we have seen that this has not been the case. In the US, for the moral damage of a spilled cup of coffee or quality goods, far higher payments are received than those of the moral damage that they have caused with such a vile act.

I don’t entirely understand her logic or the connection to this McDonald’s lawsuit, but the fundamental point is unavoidable: How is it possible that a Kyrgyz citizen can be shot in Kyrgyzstan by a foreign citizen without any legal recourse? It’s tough to say where the movement will go and what kind of support it will gather. AKIpress reader comments include “the true patriots of Kyrgyzstan and pickets will go not for the sake of money and vodka” and

If [Ivanov] had behaved that offensively and aggressively [as to get shot], as his wife is now acting in an informal setting, I can probably understand the American soldier [‘s actions]. The speakers against the base are those who did not receive and can not receive any personal benefit. And if the Americans leave, no one will be better off.

Erica Marat from the Eurasia Daily Monitor also points to the disproportionate amount of attention the outcry the shooting has gained.

“This is not the first case of foreign representatives killing Kyrgyz citizens. Previously Russian official representatives were implicated in fatal accidents on Kyrgyz territory; however, neither victims’ relatives nor the government made any visible attempts to investigate these cases. Furthermore, Kyrgyz citizens’ rights are abused regularly in Russia and Kazakhstan, where hundreds of thousands of Kyrgyz labor migrants work illegally. Finally, Kyrgyz citizens’ rights are constantly abused in border areas in the Ferghana Valley by Tajik, Uzbek, and fellow Kyrgyz border guards. Compared to Ivanov’s case, Kyrgyz civil society groups are much more ignorant about their fellow citizens’ rights residing abroad”.

I’ve seen a few postings in Russian on blogs and news comments that refer to America’s supposed plans to nuke Iran from the Manas base, a charge the anti-base movement will no doubt milk. Parliament Speaker Sultanov today however, made it clear that the base would be closed if used “for purposes other than to support the antiterrorism campaign in Afghanistan.”

You could probably weigh all the reasons that Kyrgyzstan will ultimately not force the US base out. And wonder at how Russian media can report such absurd rumors as truth. But hey – these days seemingly, it’s crass populism, and not reason, that wins interest.

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