Curiouser and curiouser. Zokir Almatov has reportedly resigned as interior minister. Fergana.ru hails the departed minister thus:
“He was a soldier and retired as one - a soldier who carried out orders of the first president.
Even when Almatov privately disagreed with some orders, he was soldier enough to carry them out first and discuss them […]

Germany’s contingent of troops will stay in Uzbekistan, as Nathan reported some while ago. I held this post back as the German media tends either to overlook Central Asia and the German involvement in the region or comes up with valuable stories rather late.
Marcus Bensmann called the permission to stay an early Christmas present […]

There is quite a bit of debate surrounding the validity of an interview/confessional in Moscow News by sometime Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) member Shukhrat Masirokhunov. (Interview here.) The latest issue of Eurasia Daily Monitor (234) summarises the points of contention.
Mind you, something rung a bell:
“Masirokhunov claims that al-Qaeda has no real unified […]

“ Survivors of torture and the May 13 massacre of unarmed protesters in Andijan, Uzbekistan, filed a case on Monday in Germany calling for the prosecution of Zokirjon Almatov, Uzbekistan’s Minister of Internal Affairs, for crimes against humanity, Human Rights Watch said today. Almatov is in Germany receiving medical treatment.”
(background.)
This probably puts the seal […]

Thanks to Nik’s last post I decided to bring up the issue that is corrupting reports that come out of our region both now and in the past. This problem is the lack of authentic information. Today, nobody can say with any degree of certainty, how many people are below poverty line in Uzbekistan. […]

It appears Sunshine Coalition is under the cosh again. Orifjan Oydin, a Turkish businessman and the husband of one of the party’s leaders, Nigara Khidayatova, was reportedly shot and killed in Kazakhstan because of his wife’s political activities. (Moscow Times/Reuters.)
On 28 November Oydin was shot by unknown assailants in the southern Kazakhstani town of […]

It’s not news per se, as the international community raises the same concerns at the end of every Central Asian cotton-picking season, but here’s a reminder. Earlier this year, ICG produced a report, entitled The Curse of Cotton: Central Asia’s Destructive Monoculture, which outlined the fundamental problems - economic, environmental, social and political, besetting […]

Uzbekistan reportedly boycotted Thursday’s meeting of NATO’s Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council. According to Reuters:
A NATO official said that although Uzbekistan — which borders Afghanistan — had not formally announced that it would not attend, it had made it clear that no one would be coming from the foreign ministry in Tashkent.
“The information available suggests clearly […]