Foreign Correspondence

[Amaunet]

Uzbekistan Evicts U.S. From Air Base

Updated 11:04 AM ET July 30, 2005


By ROBERT BURNS

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Central Asian nation of Uzbekistan has notified the State Department that U.S. military aircraft and personnel must leave an Uzbek air base that has been an important hub for American military operations in Afghanistan, a Pentagon official said Saturday.

Glenn Flood, a Pentagon spokesman, said the notice was received Friday at the U.S. Embassy in the Uzbek capital of Tashkent.

Flood said he did not know whether the Uzbeks stated a reason for evicting U.S. forces from Karshi-Khanabad air base, commonly referred to as K2.

The Washington Post, which first reported the eviction notice, said no reason was given and that U.S. forces would have six months to leave.

The Uzbek government in recent months had tightened restriction on use of the base, including banning night flights.

"We have to step back and look at our options now and see where we go from here," Flood said. "That airfield has been very important for our operations in Afghanistan" _ humanitarian as well as military.

K2 has been a critical staging point for U.S. military operations in Afghanistan since the earliest days of the war, which began in October 2001.

More recently, the base has been used to move supplies, including humanitarian aid, into northern Afghanistan. It also is a refueling point for transport planes.

The eviction notice came just days after Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld returned from a Central Asia visit to two Uzbek neighboring states, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Officials in Kyrgyzstan affirmed to Rumsfeld that U.S. forces can continue to use Manas air base for as long as the Afghan war requires.

U.S. forces do not use any bases in Tajikistan, which shares a long border with northern Afghanistan. The Pentagon has an arrangement that permits U.S. planes to refuel there under certain circumstances.

During his trip, Rumsfeld said he did not believe U.S. operations in Afghanistan would be hurt if the Uzbek government denied continued use of K2 because there are other air base options in the region.

"We're always thinking ahead. We'll be fine," Rusmfeld said on Monday.

In early July, a regional organization led by Russia and China issued a statement calling for the U.S. to set a timetable for withdrawing its forces from Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan.

Tensions in Washington's relations with Kyrgyzstan and other Central Asian nations stem partly from an eruption of violence in mid-May in the Uzbek city of Andijan.



http://dailynews.att.net/cgi-bin/news?e=pri&dt=050730&cat=news&st=newsd8blpdt80&src=...