Terror or insurgency in Uzbekistan, US Ally?

If everyone expects Bush to censure Karimov MORESO than our recent statement, where are the statements of censure from the Presidents of other countries--

Is Bush's personal statement absent from a host of others? What has Paul Martin said? Vincente Fox? Chirac? Fischer?

Straw condemns Uzbek massacre

[..] Mr Straw has condemned authorities. He said: "I am extremely concerned by reports that Uzbek troops opened fire on demonstrators in Andijan.

"I totally condemn these actions and I urge the Uzbek authorities to show restraint in dealing with the situation and look for a way to resolve it peacefully."

[..] Critics of the US have said the country has turned a "blind eye" to the situation. US has an air base there and Uzbekistan is considered an ally in the war on terror.

In a severe rebuke to London and Washington's approach to the region, Britain's former ambassador to the country yesterday said the countries had swallowed Uzbek propaganda that sought to portray the democracy movement as a brand of Islamic extremism.

Craig Murray told the IoS that the Government had to take some responsibility for the unfolding events because it had failed to support those trying to oppose the dictatorship of President Islam Karimov. He revealed that he visited Andizhan a year ago and met those trying to build a democratic opposition movement. In a bid to bolster their cause he asked the UK government to fund them. His requests were turned down by the Foreign Office.

"The Americans and British wouldn't do anything to help democracy in Uzbekistan," he said. Uzbekistan provides a base for US forces engaged in anti-terrorism operations in neighbouring Afghanistan.

Mr Murray added: "We didn't provide support for those who were trying to develop democratic opposition, and that includes these people in Andizhan. People are turning to violence because we ... gave them no support."

The former ambassador, who left the Foreign Office earlier this year after accusing the British Government of accepting intelligence gained under torture by Uzbek authorities, had called for the pro-democracy activists to be supported by the West, as elsewhere in the former Soviet Union. His requests to London were turned down. [..]

Russia's liberal Yabloko party said the unrest was an ``alarm bell'' for Karimov and for Russian President Vladimir Putin.

``Having fully repressed the democratic opposition, the Karimov regime has not left the Uzbek people any other road than the road of radical Islamism, whose leaders the population is listening to ever more closely,'' said Sergei Mitrokhin, deputy head of the party.

Uzbek expulsion sparks press protest

[..] International press freedom group Reporters Without Borders has condemned the alleged forced removal of around seven journalists from the eastern Uzbek city of Andijan by government security services.

The group also claimed that the Uzbek government was blocking broadcasts into the country by foreign news channels including BBC World, CNN and Russian network NTV.

RSF added that Russian independent news websites Lenta, Gazeta and Fergana had also been blocked by the Uzbek authorities, along with several local online news services.

"When the authorities keep journalists away from a conflict zone it is most often to hide abuses committed there. We are very concerned and urge President Islam Karimov to allow our colleagues to cover these events," the press freedom organisation said.

In a separate incident Friday, a man carrying fake explosives was shot and killed outside the Israeli Embassy in the Uzbek capital of Tashkent. Officials identified him as an unemployed ethnic Russian with a history of mental illness.

Army 'kills 200' in second Uzbek city as thousands head for border

By Peter Boehm in Andijan and Daniel Howden
The Independent
17 May 2005

Authorities in Uzbekistan have lost control of a key border town in the eastern Ferghana valley, despite a brutal clampdown that has so far claimed the lives of an estimated 700 people.

If reports of further killings can be confirmed the violence would be the most brutal of its kind in Asia since China gunned down hundreds of democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square in 1989.

The hardline government of Islam Karimov, an ally of London and Washington in the "war on terror", has dispatched an armoured force into the restive area in the east of the country after mass arrests of alleged radical Islamists sparked what appeared to be a popular uprising.

Saidjahon Zaynabitdinov, head of Appeal, a local human rights advocacy group, said troops had killed about 200 demonstrators on Saturday in Pakhtabad, just outside the city of Andijan, where witnesses saw security forces kill up to 500 civilians the previous night.

United Nations officials, rights groups and Kyrgyz border police said thousands of refugees who were fleeing the violence in and around Andijan had made for the nearby border area, leading to further unrest.

Security forces loyal to the regime of Mr Karimov had last night sealed off the town of Korasuv on the border with Kyrgyzstan.

Heavily armed police set up roadblocks on the approach to Korasuv and officials admitted they had lost control of the town, which is an economic lifeline to the more affluent and liberal Kyrgyzstan .

"There is no police in there and there is no civil administration there," a police official said.

Andijan itself has been turned into a civilian ghost town. The city, which has a population of 300,000, was dominated yesterday by a massive military presence, reinforced by police on every street corner as the government reluctantly relaxed the strict controls in which reporters were ejected and the area sealed off on Sunday. [..]

In the city centre, armoured personnel carriers, tanks and army trucks underlined the sense of a city under siege, while lorries loaded with soldiers carrying automatic rifles rumbled through.

The headquarters of the regional administration, where the protesters gathered in support of the insurrection, was still blocked off by soldiers. The blackened and charred upper storeys of what had been the nerve centre of Mr Karimov's authority, pock-marked with bullet holes, bore witness to the fighting.

Mr Karimov has sought to blame the violence on radical Islamists ­ with alleged links to al-Qa'ida ­ attempting to overthrow the secular government in Tashkent. But human rights groups and independent observers, including the former British ambassador Craig Murray, say Mr Karimov was leading a brutal police state, propped up by the arbitrary detention and torture of Muslim dissidents protesting at the desperate economic conditions.

Separatist movements in the Ferghana valley, which runs across the eastern border into Kyrgyzstan, sprang up in the early Nineties in response to Tashkent's persecution of minorities in the area. The security forces have waged a ruthless campaign to crush both the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, which seeks a Muslim state in Ferghana, and Hizb ut-Tahrir, another Islamist group whose members have been blamed for a bomb attack and labelled "terrorists" by the Karimov regime.

Sympathy for the protesters has spread as far as the capital, where a small gathering of people risked the wrath of the authorities to lay flowers in commemoration of the bloodiest days of fighting in the country's post-Soviet era.

"It was a black day in Uzbek history. We are ashamed," said Tashpulat Yuldashev, a political analyst. "We dissidents have been long been afraid of standing up to express our discontent. But this time we can't stay silent," he said.

Many of the activists were wearing black armbands and ribbons.

The rebellion in the Ferghana valley has given the country's fragmented and disorganised opposition movement a fresh momentum to unite and openly express opinions, Mr Yuldashev added. Opposition parties are banned from running in elections.

State television has so far ignored the uprising, while Western and Russian broadcasts have been cut off since the clashes began on Friday.

As we mark a victory of six days ago -- six decades ago, we are mindful of a paradox. For much of Germany, defeat led to freedom. For much of Eastern and Central Europe, victory brought the iron rule of another empire. V-E Day marked the end of fascism, but it did not end oppression. The agreement at Yalta followed in the unjust tradition of Munich and the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Once again, when powerful governments negotiated, the freedom of small nations was somehow expendable. Yet this attempt to sacrifice freedom for the sake of stability left a continent divided and unstable. The captivity of millions in Central and Eastern Europe will be remembered as one of the greatest wrongs of history.

The end of World War II raised unavoidable questions for my country: Had we fought and sacrificed only to achieve the permanent division of Europe into armed camps? Or did the cause of freedom and the rights of nations require more of us? Eventually, America and our strong allies made a decision [..]. We spoke up for dissenters, and challenged an empire to tear down a hated wall. Eventually, communism began to collapse under external pressure, and under the weight of its own contradictions. And we set the vision of a Europe whole, free, and at peace -- so dictators could no longer rise up and feed ancient grievances, and conflict would not be repeated again and again. [..]

From the vantage point of this new century, we recognize the end of the Cold War as part of an even broader movement in our world. From Germany and Japan after World War II, to Latin America, to Asia, and Central and Eastern Europe, and now to the broader Middle East, the advance of freedom is the great story of our age. And in this history, there are important lessons. [..] We have learned that governments accountable to citizens are peaceful, while dictatorships stir resentments and hatred to cover their own failings. We have learned that the skeptics and pessimists are often wrong, because men and women in every culture, when given the chance, will choose liberty. We have learned that even after a long wait in the darkness of tyranny, freedom can arrive suddenly, like the break of day. And we have learned that the demand for self-government is often driven and sustained by patriotism, by the traditions and heroes and language of a native land. [..]

As President Yushchenko works to strengthen the rule of law and open Ukraine's economy, the United States will help that nation join the institutions that bind our democracies. Later on this trip I'll travel to Georgia, another country that is taking a democratic path and deserves support on its journey. My country will stand by Georgian leaders who respect minority rights and work to peacefully unify their country [..]. We're also committed to democratic progress in Moldova [..]. All of us are committed to the advance of freedom in Belarus. The people of that country live under Europe's last dictatorship, and they deserve better. [..] Together we have set a firm and confident standard: Repression has no place on this continent. The people of Minsk deserve the same freedom you have in Tallinn, and Vilnius, and Riga. [..]

We seek democracy in [the Middle East] for the same reasons we spent decades working for democracy in Europe -- because freedom is the only reliable path to peace. If the Middle East continues to simmer in anger and resentment and hopelessness, caught in a cycle of repression and radicalism, it will produce terrorism of even greater audacity and destructive power. But if the peoples of that region gain the right of self-government, and find hopes to replace their hatreds, then the security of all free nations will be strengthened.

We will not repeat the mistakes of other generations, appeasing or excusing tyranny, and sacrificing freedom in the vain pursuit of stability. We have learned our lesson; no one's liberty is expendable. In the long run, our security and true stability depend on the freedom of others. And so, with confidence and resolve, we will stand for freedom across the broader Middle East. [..]

As in other parts of the world, the work of democracy is larger than holding a fair election [..]. Selective liberalization -- the easing of oppressive laws - is progress, but it is not enough. [..] There is no modernization without democracy. [..]

Sixty years ago [..] the world reacted with joy and relief at the defeat of fascism in Europe. [..] Yet the great democracies soon found that a new mission had come to us -- not merely to defeat a single dictator, but to defeat the idea of dictatorship on this continent. [..] In our time, as well, we must raise our sights. In the distance we can see another great goal -- not merely the absence of tyranny on this continent, but the end of tyranny in our world. Once again, we're asked to hold firm to our principles, and to value the liberty of others. And once again, if we do our part, freedom will prevail.

'Troop carriers started shooting randomly'

Jalil Saparov in Jalalabad
Wednesday May 18, 2005
The Guardian


Anonymous graves in Andijan. Cemetery workers said 37 bodies were buried under police guard; the opposition claims 745 are known to be dead. Photograph: Misha Japaridze/AP

It was extremely difficult for them to speak of their terrifying experiences, since at night they had nightmares of dead children and streets running with blood.

Just across the border from Andijan in the Jalalabad region of Kyrgyzstan, two survivors were yesterday being treated for wounds. Nabidjan Yunusov had been hit in the hip by a bullet.

"I am a businessman, trading between Tashkent and Andijan. [On Friday] I saw a lot of people gathering near the local administration building. There were women, old people and children. Some women were carrying babies in their arms.

"I asked what was going on. The demonstrators were protesting about a ruling of the local court in a case against businessmen.

"They said the judgement was unfair. They wanted the defendants released and an end to state-sponsored violence, and, above all, democracy and freedom.

"We listened for a long time. No one wanted to leave. There were no police forces to be seen. Around 4pm everything changed. Suddenly armoured troop carriers appeared in the central square and started shooting randomly at people.

"There were a lot of children and youngsters near the demonstrators, and many were the first to be hit. Panic broke out, people started running in different directions to escape the bullets.

"I ran as well, and the security forces opened fire on us. The bullets struck, and we tried to carry some of the wounded Then a bullet flashed past my head. I turned and saw a middle-aged man fall to the ground - his face covered in blood. As long as I live, I will never forget this scene. I dream about it over and over again.

"We managed to stay alive by sheltering in doorways. Later in the evening, we were able to leave the city and headed towards the Kyrgyz border. We walked the whole night through heavy rain.

"There were many women and children among us. We were hungry and exhausted. And when we got to the village of Teshiktash, we were ambushed by Uzbek forces.

"Two women and three men fell to the ground. We could do nothing for them. It was when I was trying to protect the women and children, I was wounded in the hip. The pain and the shock made me fall. The others grabbed me and we headed for the border. Only once we came across the Kyrgyz guards did we believe we'd survived.

"Local doctors took us to the Suzak hospital. We were received warmly, and provided with all we needed.

"I want to stress I did not see a single armed demonstrator. People like me turned up at the rally with no evil intent. I want to thank our Kyrgyz brothers, they greeted us so warmly. Here we feel like people, we feel the care one can expect only from relatives. We fear that if we return, the security forces will be waiting for us.

Muhamat Mavlanov, an ethnic Uzbek from Kyrgystan, had been shot in the arm. "I was in Andijan by chance, because of some business matter. I saw a large crowd, and wanted to know what was going on; we had similar events in Kyrgyzstan recently. I listened for a long time to people making speeches saying the authorities were persecuting business people, and prevented them leading a normal life.

"There were a lot of women and children. At around 4 pm shooting started from all sides. We were completely unaware this might happen.

"The first to die were children standing next to the demonstrators. Then women were killed. I, along with a crowd of people, ran to a [neighbouring] street.

"Four men were hit and fell. I was shot in the arm and fell. But people grabbed me and took me to a safe place for first aid. I saw with my own eyes how children died from gunshots to the head, how women fell, how wounded men screamed. I'll never be able to forget this bloodshed. We walked the whole night to Teshiktash, and the famous 'brilliant Uzbek soldiers' were waiting for us. They killed several of us. [People] were waving white flags and screaming they had no weapons, women and children amongst them; but they continued to shoot.

"One woman, who was wounded, fell on top of me. Her screams pierced my heart. I have no idea whether she is alive or not, but her blood is still on my clothes."

· Jalil Saparov is a contributor to Institute for War & Peace Reporting, a charity helped by the Guardian which trains local correspondents in conflict situations

This is a job for the UN!

The United States has called on Uzbekistan, an ally in Washington's war on terror, to be open about events in Andijan, while the United Nations and the European Union called for an independent inquiry. Louise Arbour, the UN high commissioner for Human Rights, said she was "deeply concerned".

Uzbek president rejects inquiry calls: UN

20 May 2005
The United Nations says the President of Uzbekistan, Islam Karimov, has rejected requests for an international inquiry into the killing of a large number of demonstrators last week in the eastern city of Andijan.

International human rights organisations now estimate that up to 1,000 civilians may have died when the security forces opened fire on protestors.

The Uzbek authorities have said that 169 people were killed, many of whom they described as terrorists.

The UN's Human Rights Commissioner, Louise Arbour, said calls for an investigation had gone unheeded.

General Says US Scaled Back Its Military Operations in Uzbekistan

By Brian Purchia
Washington DC
20 May 2005


The head of the U.S. Central Command, General John Abizaid, says the United States has scaled back its military operations in Uzbekistan since last week's violence in the Central Asian country. Two leading human rights organizations say Uzbek security forces may have killed as many as 1,000 civilians in the eastern city of Andijan.

Also Thursday, Uzbek troops regained control of the eastern border town of Korasuv and arrested local rebel leaders. And in Washington the United States Helsinki Commission held a briefing on the crisis in Uzbekistan


The Vienna-based International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights and the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan claim that up to 1,000 unarmed civilians were killed in Andijan last week and 2,000 others were injured.

The Uzbek government has denied its troops opened fire on innocent civilians. Uzbek President Islam Karimov maintains that 169 people were killed in clashes between Uzbek authorities and militants.

However, Uzbek refugees in Kyrgyzstan dispute this. Mahmood, who was wounded in the Andijan crackdown said, "The crowds decided to form in a tight group, women in the middle, and the men protecting them on the outside. The soldiers then started shooting us like dogs."

Meanwhile, Uzbek troops retook control of the eastern town of Korasuv where rebels had announced they would build a strict Islamic state. The group's leaders were arrested. No bloodshed was reported. Some residents said there was sporadic firing.

In Washington, one Uzbek expert said at a Helsinki Commission briefing on Uzbekistan that unlike recent revolutions in Georgia or Ukraine there may not be a smooth transition of power in Uzbekistan. Martha Olcott is a Senior Associate at the Carnegie Endowment For International Peace. She said, "More likely, is the scenario where the government simply crumbles, in the face of widening popular opposition, which can no longer be contained through the use or threat of force."

Uzbekistan is a country of strategic interest to the U.S. and an ally on the war on terror.

Michael Cromartie, the head of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, says it is important that the U.S. speak with a unified voice to the Uzbek government, something it hasn't always done. "Last year the State Department refused to provide funding for the Uzbek government, due to its human rights violations. Yet, one month later the Defense Department granted funds to the Uzbek government."

The United States, the U.N. and Britain have all called for an independent international investigation into the deadly events in Andijan. But, Uzbekistan's President Karimov says what happened is an internal affair.

COMMENTARY

OPINION

Friday, May 20, 2005

Are Britain and U.S. repeating mistake?

JOHANN HARI
SYNDICATED COLUMNIST

Welcome to the New Middle East. On your left, you'll see the largest Asian massacre since Tienanmen Square. Look -- they're hosing blood off the streets. To your right, you can see some dissidents being boiled alive, while the local regime smirks they had "an accident with a kettle." Ah, and here's a dictator who reminisces about his trips to the White House and brags: "I'm prepared to rip off the heads of 200 people, to sacrifice their lives, in order to save peace and calm in the republic. If my child chose such a path, I would rip off his head myself."

The debate about Uzbekistan has been weirdly unreal. The Uzbek people are rebelling because they live in grinding, binding poverty and have no freedoms at all. Many still live on Soviet-style collectivized farms and earn less than $2 a day. True, there is a small Islamic fundamentalist political movement in the country, but in the current rebellion all the classic jihadist tactics -- such as suicide bombs or targeting civilians -- have been scrupulously avoided, with only the police feeling the force of their rage. Yet all it has taken is for Islam Karimov to cry "terrorism!" and most Western politicians and journalists have acted as though the "war on terror" is the reason why Britain and the United States are deeply enmeshed with the Karimov tyranny.

Yes, the Uzbek KGB provides us with some intelligence on apparent al-Qaida cells, but according to a man who has read all of it -- Craig Murray, Britain's ambassador to the country post-9/11 -- it is "totally useless." This is hardly surprising, since Karimov is "systematically" using torture, according to the United Nations. Information acquired via electrodes is as useful as the European confessions of witchcraft in the 16th century.

Any benefit to the "terror war" from reading this junk is far outweighed by the damage to that same "war" caused by our association with Karimov.

All experts on the region agree that Karimov's Stalin-era policies of criminalizing Islam, no matter how mild or pluralistic, is directly fuelling jihadism. As one member of the European Parliament's Uzbekistan relations committee explains: "By supporting Karimov, we are helping to create the very thing we fear -- Islamic fundamentalism. Islam has never been strong in central Asia. Even before the Russians came, alcohol was widely drunk, prayer observed fitfully. Now, a visitor sees neither beards nor headscarves ... yet official persecution is giving fundamentalists their opening in the region. Ordinary Uzbeks, constantly told that all opponents of the regime are Islamic radicals, are understandably wondering whether there might not be something in this ideology." And by shoveling cash to Karimov and building bases on Uzbek soil, we are ensuring angry Uzbeks will ultimately blame us for their oppression -- and possibly make us pay a blood-price for it. Jihadism was born in the Middle East when the West supported savage dictators; why repeat the mistake?

No; the reasons for our governments' connections to Karimov are rather different. Uzbekistan's first uprising -- the first of many -- is being crushed by U.S.-trained troops and with U.S. funds, in return for access to the last great oil-grab in history. The Republican regime in the White House wants to be part of the global scramble for the final untapped stash of fossil fuels on Earth, before the carbon-burning party winds to an end.

Central Asia holds up to 243 billion barrels of crude, worth around $4 trillion -- enough to meet the West's energy needs for years -- and Uzbekistan is in the region's dead (and I mean dead) center. A strategic decision was clearly taken that, if this requires them to fund and fuel Karimov, the butcher of Uzbekistan -- and inadvertently recreate the Middle East in central Asia -- so be it.

This isn't just my view. In 1998, Dick Cheney, when he was still CEO of the oil firm Halliburton, explained, "I cannot think of a time when we have had a region emerge as suddenly to become as strategically significant as the Caspian (central Asia's source of oil)." Three years later, Cheney was responsible for the National Energy Report, which recommended "the president make energy security a priority of our trade and foreign policy."

Their words. Their intentions.

At a time when oil supplies are either vulnerable to jihadist coups (as in Saudi Arabia, where our governments still back and arm the odious House of Saud) or are simply running dry, the oil industry is ravenous for new supplies. In some places -- such as Iraq -- this thirst will lead the United States to overthrow tyrants but, in just as many places, such as Uzbekistan, it will lead them to prop up oil-and-pipeline-friendly tyrants, with the British government following closely behind. The question "do they let us buy and sell their oil?" determines policy, not the question "do they terrorize their people?"

So we ignore the voices of the Uzbek people; nobody wants to know the price for our carbon-economy. The rote condemnations offered by the U.S. and British governments do not match their actions. (The United States' call for "peaceful resistance" -- in a country where people regularly "disappear" for joking about the leader -- is preposterous). Look at the plight of Craig Murray as British ambassador. He did everything a representative of democracy should: He spoke out against Karimov's butchery, and offered dissidents support and protection. He was repaid with the sack, and a vicious smear campaign. There is no point having a fake argument about whether Karimov is a necessary but ugly ally in the war on terror, when the real argument is about whether it is worth trading the human rights of 25 million Uzbeks for access to remaining oil supplies.

We must be honest: That is what the current policy amounts to. At the best of times, trading human lives and human dignity for oil would be repellent, but right now, it would be near suicidal. Islamic fundamentalism will pose a genuine threat to free societies in the coming age of WMD, where the technologies of destruction are terrifyingly easy to acquire. We need to undercut the causes of Islamic fundamentalism -- particularly Western-backed tyranny in the Muslim world -- now.

Even more important, the petrol-based economy that these excursions into central Asia are designed to prop up is an environmental disaster for all humans, and finding a new set of dealers for our fossil-fuel habit is not the solution.

Some U.S. environmentalists have tried to turn this insight into what they call a "geo-green movement" to make Americans realize they need urgently to begin the transition away from dirty fuels, for the sake of human rights abroad and for the planet. It's time for a British counterpart. For the sake of us and for the sake of the Uzbeks, it's time to wake up and smell the petrol.

Johann Hari writes for The Independent in Britain.

Michael Cromartie, the head of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, says it is important that the U.S. speak with a unified voice to the Uzbek government, something it hasn't always done. "Last year the State Department refused to provide funding for the Uzbek government, due to its human rights violations. Yet, one month later the Defense Department granted funds to the Uzbek government."

Uzbekistan's protesters would seem to stand little chance against Mr Karimov's security forces, who have shown they will stop at nothing to crush dissent. Furthermore, no popular, reformist figure like Georgia's Mikhail Saakashvili or Ukraine's Victor Yushchenko has yet emerged for the Uzbek opposition to rally around. Nevertheless, the anti-government protests in Georgia, Ukraine and then Kirgizstan all eventually prevailed, despite initial expectations that regime change was unlikely.

So will Mr Karimov be the next strongman in the region to fall? Certainly it is notable that protesters are increasingly focusing their discontent on the president himself, and demanding his resignation, instead of blaming local officials. Pressure within the regime for a change of leader is likely to grow, particularly if vested interests in the political hierarchy start doubting Mr Karimov's ability to guarantee their privileges.

However, even if rising protests do eventually force him to step down, the outcome may not, in the first instance, be a more democratic, liberalising government. In the absence of a charismatic opposition leader, power may instead pass to a supporter of the current regime from among the country's dominant clans. If so, there may be little hope of economic reform, just a redistribution among the elite of the spoils of power. This would do nothing to alleviate the growing economic and social concerns of a population that seems increasingly willing to challenge those in authority.

Where torture and terror rule

The slaughter of civilians by Uzbek troops has exposed to the world President Islam Karimov's war on his own people. Travelling across the country, Justin Marozzi heard the voices of fear everywhere

Friday May 20, 2005
The Guardian

I travelled across Uzbekistan to research a biography of Tamerlane, the 14th-century Tatar conqueror known locally as Amir Temur. I hadn't expected to see so many pictures of him. He stared at you wherever you went, from news-paper mastheads to highest denomination banknotes. A magnificent statue of him on horseback dominated a square that bore his name in the heart of Tashkent.

The clue to his re-emergence from decades of Soviet-sanctioned vilification came on a series of street hoardings portraying Tamerlane and President Islam Karimov together. Styled in the Soviet era as a murderous barbarian - he cut a swath through Asia, celebrating his victories by building towers from the severed heads of his enemies - Tamerlane had become the hero of the newly sovereign Uzbekistan.

"It is well known that this dignified and just ruler always dealt with the world with good and kind intentions," proclaimed Khalq Sozi, the official organ of Karimov's People's Democratic party. [..]

Contemporary sources report Tamerlane's execution of 100,000 prisoners in cold blood shortly before his storming of Delhi in 1398. On taking Baghdad in 1401, he erected 120 towers containing 90,000 skulls. The parallel, then, is not entirely absurd: Tamerlane and Karimov are both butchers, only the Tatar's depredations were on a global, rather than a domestic, scale.

In Uzbekistan I found a wildly romantic country of desert, steppe and mountain, with stretching landscapes and architectural treasures of Bukhara, Samarkand and Khiva that simmered in the imagination. But it was a beleaguered place, its people downtrodden, its strutting security forces bent on following and, if possible, obstructing your every move. If the police wanted to go though your suitcase every day, there wasn't much you could do about it (Uzbeks call their capital Tashment, "ment" being the slang for cop). Local translators risked night-time visits from state-paid thugs in uniform. Who had the foreigner been talking to and why? What was he doing in Uzbekistan? Punch. Slap. Threats. [..]

Ask the award-winning poet and dissident writer Mamadali Mahmudov what he makes of Karimov's mantra Rasti Rusti (Strength in Justice), borrowed from Tamerlane. Ask him too what the inside of an Uzbek prison looks like. Mahmudov was arrested on February 19 1999, three days after a series of bomb explosions aimed at Karimov rocked Tashkent. He was charged with threatening the president and the constitutional order and sentenced to 14 years in prison. His chief crime appears to have been links to the Erk opposition party, outlawed by the government since 1993.

The following excerpts are taken from his testimony smuggled out of court in 2000: "They put a mask on me and [kept me] handcuffed ... My hands and legs were burned. My nails turned black and fell off. I was hung for hours with my hands tied behind my back. I was given some kind of injection and I was forced to take some kind of syrup ... In wet clothing, in my icy prison cell, I spent the days and nights all alone in unbearable suffering ... They told me they were holding my wife and daughters and threatened to rape them in front of my eyes."

The UN's words for torture in Uzbekistan are "widespread and systemic". Mahmudov remains in jail; in 2003, he was moved to Chirchik prison where the conditions are said to be less harsh.

If Karimov now faces a serious challenge from domestic Islamists - and it is not at all clear that he does, because all dissidents and opposition groups are routinely labelled as Islamic fundamentalists - he has only himself to blame. The mosque in Uzbekistan has become a refuge from the regime. A small number may be terrorists, among them members of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. The majority are not.

In the ancient city of Bukhara, [..] the minarets are strangely silent. When I asked the imam of the great Kalon Mosque, an affable man with a snowy beard, why the muezzins were not broadcasting the call to prayer, he looked uncomfortable. He was appointed by the state and his sermons were monitored. There were a number of different religious minorities in the city, he explained, and no one wanted to disturb them in the night. During travels in a dozen or so Muslim countries, I have never encountered such solicitude for the beauty sleep of the unbelievers.

In the northwestern town of Muynak, victim of the Aral Sea environmental catastrophe, toxic winds unleashed chemicals across the town. The people looked shockingly sick. A fish-canning factory resembling a medieval dungeon paid its workers in melons.

In tears, the owner of my hotel, a single mother, said she didn't have enough money to feed her newborn baby and pay for the electricity. In the midst of this misery, the mayor, a fat venal man with a penchant for expensive suits, was laying an elaborate Tarmac drive to his mansion. "Don't listen to the people," he replied furiously when I relayed complaints from the streets. [..]

Murad, who gallantly fielded masses of research requests from me, spoke of his repeated beatings by police. His crime? He is homosexual.

Scroll through the comments on the BBC's website posted by Uzbeks unable to express their opposition to Karimov any other way. Some use pseudonyms for their own security. "Governments who are still allies and support Karimov's repressive regime should be condemned," writes Abdullah from Samarkand. "This guy [Karimov] is going to end up dead some day in a very unpleasant manner," warns Kunchilik Uzbakov. [..]

· Justin Marozzi is the author of Tamerlane: Sword of Islam, Conqueror of the World, published in paperback this summer by HarperCollins.

Anger as US backs brutal regime

Nick Paton Walsh in Moscow and Paul Harris in New York
Sunday May 15, 2005
The Observer

[..] Uzbekistan is believed to be one of the destination countries for the highly secretive 'renditions programme', whereby the CIA ships terrorist suspects to third-party countries where torture is used that cannot be employed in the US. Newspaper reports in America say dozens of suspects have been transferred to Uzbek jails.

The CIA has never officially commented on the programme. But flight logs obtained by the New York Times earlier this month show CIA-linked planes landing in Tashkent with the same serial numbers as jets used to transfer prisoners around the world. The logs show at least seven flights from 2002 to late 2003, originating from destinations in the Middle East and Europe.

Other countries used in the programme include Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and Morocco. A handful of prisoners' accounts - including that of Canadian Maher Arar - that emerged after release show they were tortured and abused in custody.

Critics say the US double standards are evident on the State Department website, which accuses Uzbek police and security services of using 'torture as a routine investigation technique' while giving the same law enforcement services $79 million in aid in 2002. [..]

The aid paradox was highlighted by the former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan, Craig Murray, who criticised coalition support for Uzbekistan when they were planning invading Iraq, using similar abuses as justification. Murray said yesterday: '[..] They help fund the budget of the Uzbek security services and give tens of millions of dollars in military support. [..]'.

Murray said that during a series of suicide bombings in Tashkent in March 2004, before he was sacked as UK ambassador, he was shown transcripts of telephone intercepts in which known al-Qaeda representatives were asking each other 'what the hell was going on. But then Colin Powell came out and said that al-Qaeda were behind the blasts. I don't think the US even believe their own propaganda.'

The support continues, seen by many as a 'pay-off' for the Khanabad base. The US Embassy website says Uzbekistan got $10m for 'security and law enforcement support' in 2004.

Last year Human Rights Watch released a 319-page report detailing the use of torture by Uzbekistan's security services. It said the government was carrying out a campaign of torture and intimidation against Muslims that had seen 7,000 people imprisoned, and documented at least 10 deaths, including Muzafar Avozov, who was boiled to death in 2002.

Links to regime limit UK and US response

Richard Norton-Taylor, Ewen MacAskill and Julian Borger in Washington
Tuesday May 17, 2005
The Guardian

Britain has been increasing sales to Uzbekistan of equipment with potential military use, despite condemnation of its human rights record by the foreign secretary, Jack Straw.

Export licences have been approved for "strategic exports" ever since Uzbekistan became an ally in the "war on terror". The government said last year it approved export licences for "armoured personnel carriers", which could be used for internal repression. [..]

Uzbekistan's Karshi-Khanabad airbase, known to US forces as K2 or Camp Stronghold Freedom, has been vital to military operations in Afghanistan. [..] John Pike, the head of the military analysis website GlobalSecurity.org, said close ties with Uzbekistan also serve longer-term goals. "It's one more piece of the Soviet Union that's in our power rather than in Moscow's power.

"It's also one more piece of the encirclement of Iran. Right now, it's a base for operations in Afghanistan. What it might become 10 years from now is anyone's guess. It's part of the 'great game'."

Germany, too, has a base in Uzbekistan, at Termez, for Afghan operations where its troops are part of a Nato force. [..]

[C]ontradictions are mirrored in the US. Last July the state department refused to certify that Uzbekistan had made progress in its human rights record, thereby cutting $18m (£10m) in military and economic aid. Within weeks, however, the chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, General Richard Myers arrived in Tashkent and suggested the state department's stand was misguided. He announced new aid of $21m to help Uzbekistan clean up an old Soviet biological weapons facility.