Russian Foreign Minister arrived today in Tashkent. There really isn’t much to dwell on, just the standard stabilisation talk Russian officials keep pursuing so eagerly whenever the future of Central Asia is discussed. The rhetoric doesn’t seem to change over time.

Perhaps, the Kazakh leader is the only one who takes the prospect of Central Asian integration a bit more seriously as evidenced by his today’s statement. He said that a draft resolution on the creation of the Union of Central Asian States will soon be sent to all Central Asian leaders.

Lavrov’s visit could in fact be viewed as a swift reaction of the Russian government to Rice’s tour of Central Asia last week. It seems like Lavrov came over to compensate for the damage suffered by the Uzbeks and Turkmens as a result of the neglect and criticisms piled on them by the U.S. administration. He was so nice as to visit the University of World Economy and Diplomacy and deliver a speech there. [This made me think of the lecture Rice gave at the Eurasian University on her visit to Astana last week.]

In short, that was probably a special mission intended to once again demonstrate to the whole world that there is a lot more Russia is going to gain by strengthening the new alliance than the Western countries would want to think. This was done to counterbalance the Western pressure and show approval of the Uzbek leadership’s hard-line policies.

While no explicit reference to Andijan was made Lavrov surely meant to imply that Russia will stick to Uzbekistan’s version of events “till the end”, i.e. as long as Uzbekistan is interested in maintaining close ties with Russia. He stated, among other things, that colour revolutions have failed to live up to the expectations and only lead to negative consequences.