Read Shanghai or Bust by Prajakti Kalra and Siddharth Saxena, Central Asia Now’s latest piece of analysis.
United Nations’ human rights commissioner, Louise Arbour, began her tour of Central Asia this week. Starting in Kyrgyzstan, Arbour raised concerns with President Kurmanbek Bakiyev and other officials in the capital, Bishkek, about the levels of domestic violence against women. Further, with the apparent persecution of the political opposition and the imprisonment of its leaders Omurbek Subanaliev and Omurbek Abdyrakmanov, Arbour called for an independent investigation into Kyrgyzstan’s judicial process. Any hopes which Arbour may have had of constructive dialogue with neighbouring Uzbekistan, however, proved fruitless, as she was effectively snubbed by government officials who refused to even meet her. Arbour will also visit Tajikistan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan over the coming week. Kazakhstan remains a source of concern for human rights activists over its crackdown on demonstrations and peaceful protests. Demonstrations are permitted but must be authorized by the government and are tightly monitored and controlled.
After last week’s heavy rainfall which has led to mudslides in southern Kyrgyzstan, EurasiaNet summarised a United Nations report that says situation is set to worsen over the coming decades with temperatures rising and water resources depleting. With both Uzbekistan and Tajikistan reliant on the cotton industry, such changes would bring about economic disaster.
The race to secure Turkmenistan’s rich energy resources continued with the EU and USA competing against Russia to access oil through two opposing pipelines. The EU and US proposal to ship oil through a new pipeline running under the Caspian sea to Azerbaijan is a real threat to Russia’s energy trade links with Turkmenistan. Russia has proposed an alternative pipeline which will run along the Caspian sea coast through Russian territory but Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov refuses to commit to either project. Russian President Vladamir Putin hopes to make further progress on the issue during his visit to Turkmenistan on May 13th. Meanwhile, as United Press International reported, China’s state run Sinopec has threatened to abandon its oil and gas projects in Uzbekistan over its high tax rates for oil extraction.
Health and disease control remains an important issue in Tajikistan as despite success such as the successful vaccination against Polio of 300,000 children along the Afghan border, awareness of the fight against the global threat of HIV and AIDS is worryingly low. Despite the high percentage of young people who are aware of the virus, almost half those participating in a recent survey supported by UNAIDS was unaware of how to prevent infection. Despite Tajikistan’s low level of reported cases, there has been a steady increase in number of HIV-infected people.
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