Foreign Correspondence

[Amaunet]

In addition to influencing Afghanistan the anti-government propaganda of the HT might have had some contribution to the public uprising against the Akayev government in Kyrgyzstan. Hizbut Tehir began activism in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.


What we have are the Muslims, China, Russia and the United States all fighting for influence in Central Asia.

Kyrgyzstan while marked for takeover by one of Bush’s velvet revolutions jumped the gun and the outcome of this country is still up in the air.

Here are some texts on HT.

-Am

Kyrgyzstan curse
By Swati Parashar


May 12, 2005


NEW DELHI - What would be the impact, if any, of the recent crisis in Kyrgyzstan in Central Asia - that resulted in the overthrow of the government of Askar Akayev - on the growth of religious extremism in Central Asia in general and in Kyrgyzstan in particular?

Kyrgyzstan on the strategic map
With a population of about 5 million, Kyrgyzstan is a country of nomadic Sunni Muslims. It is a poor country lacking in energy resources or mineral deposits, but has been an important strategic ally of the United States and Russia.

Post September 11, it was Kyrgyzstan that provided the much needed air base that the US was looking for to assist in its Afghan campaign. About 1,500 US, French and South Korean coalition troops are stationed at a base near Bishkek. Russia, too, has a base in Kyrgyzstan and there has been considerable public agitation within the country against American imperialism and what many perceive as Islamophobia of the West.

The events in Kyrgyzstan have once again brought the Hizbut Tehrir, (HT), an Islamic movement that has a worldwide presence and network, under close scrutiny by the international community. After its initial religious and political activities in the Middle East, the HT today has a visible presence in Central Asia. With its aim of uniting all Muslims of the world under what it projects as a perfect Islamic caliphate, the HT perceives ample opportunities for its growth and the realization of its final vision in the Muslim-dominated and politically and economically unstable states of Central Asia.

The HT initially began its activism in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan and established itself strongly in the Ferghana Valley. It is banned in several countries, including states in Central Asia, and the governments there have arrested and detained several of its members. Today it is a potent political and religious force in all the Central Asian states, barring Turkmenistan.

The HT is of concern in any analysis of the present Kyrgyz crisis, for several reasons. The anti-government propaganda of the HT might have had some contribution to the public uprising against the Akayev government. We must bear in mind that conditions in other Central Asian states are worse and public resentment is high against these governments. In fact, Akayev, the first president to face the wrath of the people, was relatively more liberal and responsive. HT activities in Kyrgyzstan are concentrated in the southern part of the country, in and around the Kyrgyz-controlled part of the Ferghana Valley. HT members are especially active in the Osh region and about 20 loyalists were arrested there in 2002.

In an interview given to the Jamestown Foundation in March 2004, Sadykzhan Kamuluddin (Kamalov), president of the Islamic Center of the Republic of Kyrgyzstan and former mufti and member of the Kyrgyzstan Supreme Council, asserted that Kyrgyzstan alone had about 2,000-3,000 members of the HT, suggesting that the HT was numerically strongest in Kyrgyzstan. He claimed that the government was unwittingly assisting the HT in its propaganda by imprisoning and persecuting members of the party. In fact, the head of the Committee of National Security in Kyrgyzstan stated in early 2004 that the HT was a prominent force in the struggle for power.

Apart from carrying out political agitation in the Kyrgyz state, the HT has also been accused of terrorist activities, although it has a stated agenda of non-violence. In November 2003, Kyrgyz State Security announced the capture of three HT members planning to blow up the US airbase at Manas. A number of Kyrgyz nationals have been caught as members of the HT with explosives in Russia. Bishkek authorities have also reported from time to time about developing links between the extremist organizations like the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) and the Islamic Movement of Turkestan (IMT) in Central Asia and the HT and between the East Turkistan Islamic Movement and other Uighur separatist groups and the HT.

Along with the HT, radical Islamist organizations like the IMT and IMU have also had a visible presence in Kyrgyzstan. IMU militants have been infiltrating the Kyrgyz state in the southern region of Batken since 1999, causing a lot of disturbances in the country. The 2002-2003 bombings in the Kyrgyz towns of Bishkek and Osh resulted in the conviction of Uzbek and Kyrgyz nationals who belonged to the IMU/IMT and who were trained in Afghanistan and Chechnya. In 2003, repeated attempts were made by the IMU to target the American Embassy in Kyrgyzstan.

Thus, affected by the political activism of the HT and terrorist activities by other radical groups, Kyrgyzstan has been a fertile ground for the growth of fundamentalist Islam. Mosque building and madrassa (seminary) activities in Kyrgyzstan allegedly receive financial aid not only from other Central Asian states, but also from Pakistan.

The government of Akayev had taken several measures to control the spread of radical ideas. One was the adoption of a strict licensing system regulating the publication of religious printed matter, by the Ulema Council, Kyrgyzstan's foremost spiritual body for Islamic affairs. A number of other regulations were also passed by the Kyrgyz State Commission for Religious Affairs to govern religious expression and counter radical elements.

But it must be pointed out that since the breakup of the Soviet Union, it is Kyrgyzstan among the five Central Asian republics that has adopted the most liberal approach toward Islamic fundamentalist organizations, and even the HT has been relatively free to pursue its activities. However, in the light of the present political crisis, Kyrgyzstan could either fall into the hands of radical Islamic elements or the liberal approach could undergo a change resulting in more repressive policies and rigorous control by the new regime, which could aggravate the internal situation.

Implications
The recent developments should be a cause for concern to the countries of the region. The biggest threat in the medium and long term is perhaps the likely strengthening of fundamentalist forces either led by the HT or by the IMT or the IMU, which have a tradition of engaging in violent activities. A fundamentalist takeover of a country in Central Asia long visualized by Islamic radical forces like the HT and the IMU would be a big blow to the so-called "war on terror" led by the US and its allies. Central Asia's vast energy resources may become targets of attack and similar uprisings might be instigated in other Central Asian republics, thereby destabilizing the region. Intensified activities of the IMU and the HT in Central Asia will also have an impact on other parts of Asia.

Kyrgyzstan also faces a threat from Uighur separatists from the Xinjiang region in western China, who may seize this opportunity and strengthen themselves in Kyrgyz territory. China shares several hundreds of kilometers of border with Kyrgyzstan in the western province of Xinjiang and both China and the Kyrgyz government of Akayev had been actively involved in anti-terrorism exercises and anti-terrorism cooperation. How effective the counter-terrorism policies of the new government and its cooperation with China will be remains to be seen.

Conclusion
The public uprising against Akayev's government in Kyrgyzstan, if studied closely in the wake of some recent developments, should not come as a surprise. Opposition to the government was growing in the last two years and was supported by the mainstream political opponents of Akayev and radical Islamists like the HT, each with a different motive. A series of protests had been taking place since 2002, the most notable being riots in the Jalalabad region in southern Kyrgyzstan that had even led to several deaths. Several HT activists were taken into custody.

It would be only speculative to claim that Akayev paid the price for his leniency toward radical elements and political opposition, and that more stringent control over dissenting voices as practiced by other Central Asian regimes like Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan might have helped him retain power. It is perhaps only a matter of time before other governments also meet a similar fate as public resentment is rife in all Central Asian republics.

Kyrgyzstan is at the crossroads. There are two possible scenarios. It can either be the first state in Central Asia to be hijacked by radical forces led by the HT, and can plunge into political instability and civil conflict, or the opposition forces can use this opportunity to build a stable and secular republic which could be a role model in the region.

Swati Parashar is a research associate with the International Terrorism Watch Project of the Observer Research Foundation. She is based in New Delhi. Email address [e-mail]

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(Copyright 2005, Swati Parashar)


http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/GE12Ag01.html



The 'Talibanization' of Central Asia


May 12, 2005
By M K Bhadrakumar

Three successive waves of political Islam have swept over Central Asia during the 15-year period since the disintegration of the Soviet Union. They might seem dissimilar. But they have common elements - the most important being that they all had extra-regional profiles, even as they sought a habitation and name in the region. To the naked eye, they appear as interpolators on a civilization that was historically eclectic. They are the monstrous progenies of "foreign devils on the Silk Road" - of Central Asia's globalization.

The first wave of political Islam appeared in Tajikistan in 1992, seeking to make the country an Islamic state. The Islamic rebels were initially concentrated in the southern provinces of Kulyab and Kurgan Tyube, but incrementally linked up with elements in neighboring Afghanistan. By 1996 they were operating from within Afghanistan. Their leaders were domiciled in Iran and Pakistan.

The Tajik civil war involved factions, but they were ideological overlaps of secular democracy, nationalist reformism and Islamization. A listing of the parties involved in the protracted Tajik peace process under United Nations auspices (1994-96) is revealing - Russia, the United States, Iran, Pakistan, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the Organization of the Islamic Conference.

The American perspective on the Tajik civil war (1992-96) was that it was a power struggle involving clans or regional cliques, and was engineered by Russia with a view to justifying its military presence in Central Asia. But, its reasoning was seriously flawed - that there were no Islamist elements in Afghanistan interested in a spillover into Central Asia; the Taliban was an indigenous Afghan phenomenon who did not have any regional agenda; Afghan fratricidal strife was purely about capturing power in Kabul; and that the Taliban would be ultimately a factor of regional stability. (Americans were not alone living in a different intellectual universe. As late as June 1995, at a conference convened by the US Institute of Peace, French scholar Olivier Roy laughed off the very thought that there could be "revolution-exporting Islamic fundamentalists in Afghanistan".)

At any rate, alarmed by the ascendancy of the Taliban (leading to the capture of Kabul in 1996) and signs that the Tajik Islamists were increasingly coming under the influence of rival benefactors, Russia and Iran swiftly closed ranks to bring about a Tajik settlement, giving Tajik Islamists a role in the government in Dushanbe. Ironically, the regional rivalries hastened the Tajik settlement. The US, predictably, debunked the settlement and continued to move on the old track, encouraging Central Asian states to forge cooperative links with the Taliban regime in Kabul. This line continued almost right up to the bombing of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in August 1998.

No sooner than the Tajik settlement came about, the Uzbek militants who fought alongside the Tajik Islamists broke away and linked up with the Taliban. The period from 1996-2001 saw the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) operating from Taliban-ruled areas within Afghanistan and stepping up violent activities inside Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan in particular.

The IMU was the second wave of political Islam to appear in Central Asia. Unlike the Tajik Islamists, the IMU assumed distinct Wahhabi trappings, and called for jihad against the established secular regimes. The US approach was once again imbued with regional rivalry with Russia - that Russia was "exploiting" a non-existent threat of militant Islam for the sake of dominating Central Asia.

Washington proceeded to adopt an ambivalent attitude toward the regional initiative involving Russia and Central Asian states (and subsequently including Iran and India) for the strengthening of anti-Taliban resistance in Afghanistan. The American stance finally took a u-turn only with the September 11, 2001, attacks. The US went on to secure military bases in Central Asia on the new imperative to forge a common front against "Islamic terror".

The collaboration with al-Qaeda was certainly the IMU's (and Taliban leadership's) fatal mistake. In the American military intervention in Afghanistan in October 2001, the IMU's cadres retreated to Pakistan's tribal agencies - along with the Taliban. No one knows what happened thereafter. According to some Western media reports, the IMU leaders are in American custody.

At any rate, in the void left by the IMU, a third wave of political Islam has appeared in Central Asia - Hizbut Tehrir (HT - Party of Islamic Liberation). Unlike the earlier manifestations of political Islam, HT claims to be a pan-Islamic movement. HT subscribes to the goal of establishing a Sharia-based caliphate in Central Asia and "dividing Russia along the line of the Volga" so as to liberate the "originally Muslim lands".

HT remains in many ways an enigma wrapped in mystery - much like the Taliban. American media organs periodically interview HT spokesmen, but no one says where its leadership is based. HT is believed to be getting its financing from "Arab charities" and its "branches" in some Western countries. HT resembles a hierarchical pyramid consisting of five-member cells at its base, each with a leader. No two cells interact directly. Leaders of every four cells are grouped as a local body under a naquib who, in turn, belongs to a regional council headed by a muta'amad (head of a region). The muta'amads work independently under the amir's (supreme leader's) supervision. The entire arrangement is on a "need-to-know" basis.

The recruits are not required to have any detailed knowledge of Islam but must be committed to the jihad and the Sharia-based goals of the party. They attend clandestine "study classes" stretched over months that can extend up to 18 months. The curricula ranges from religion to world politics.

Without doubt, the great social and economic upheavals in the Central Asian region provide a fertile ground to HT. To quote the well-known scholar, Anatol Lieven, "In depressing circumstances, adherence to a radical Islamic network provides a sense of cultural security, a new community and some degree of social support - modest, but still better than anything the state can provide." Thus, American specialists on Central Asia have begun describing HT as the region's "most popular radical Islamic group".

The HT spokesmen openly acknowledge that the present "revolutionary climate" in Central Asia works to their advantage. Associated Press news agency reported on May 1 that, "according to Dr Imran Waheed, HT's London-based spokesman, the region remains a fertile recruiting ground, with local membership soaring". Western think-tanks estimate HT's hard core to be in the region of 20,000 cadres. Central Asian security agencies put the figure as 60,000. By any reckoning, HT would be the single-biggest cadre-based political movement today in the region. HT professes non-violent methods. But it is believed that HT has a parallel military structure. It is an intriguing thought how exactly HT co-relates with the dormant IMU cadres in Central Asia, estimated by Western intelligence agencies to be in the region of 3,000-5,000 militants.

Central Asian countries and Russia have proscribed HT as a terrorist organization. Uzbekistan has blamed HT and/or IMU for several incidents of violence. But the US refuses (unlike Germany) to list HT as a militant organization, apparently for want of evidence. Conceivably, the US's regional policy considerations would explain this differentiated approach. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization's lead role in combating religious extremism in the region after all makes this Russia and China's "crusade" against militant Islam.

Indeed, the leader of the Islamic Party of Tajikistan, Deputy Prime Minister Hoji Akbar Turajonzoda, has alleged that HT is a Western-sponsored bogeyman for "remaking Central Asia". He said, "A more detailed analysis of HT's programmatic and ideological views and concrete examples of its activities suggests that it was created by anti-Islamic forces. One proof of this is the comfortable existence this organization enjoys in a number of Western countries, where it has large centers and offices that develop its concept of an "Islamic caliphate".

Osh and Jalalabad, the cities which spearheaded the regime change in Kyrgyzstan, happen to be HT strongholds. HT will hugely gain in an entire belt stretching from the Fergana provinces of Namangan, Andizhan and Kokand (contiguous to Osh and Jalalabad) to the adjacent Penjekent Valley (Uzbekistan) and Khojent (Tajikistan).

Similar to the early 1990s when the Taliban seemed an alternative to mujahideen misrule, it is tempting to view HT as a counterpoint to Central Asia's political elites. But can that be the whole picture? The Afghan experience should offer sobering thoughts. Afghanistan too, like Central Asia, had its history - into which Islamists were introduced as agents of change. Many thought that these Islamists would be birds of passage for a time of transition. Instead they settled in. So much so that Afghan President Hamid Karzai faces an existential dilemma distinguishing the good, bad and the ugly among them.

M K Bhadrakumar is a former Indian career diplomat who has served in Islamabad, Kabul, Tashkent and Moscow.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/GE12Ag02.html