Kyrgyz See Base Motives at Work in Base Politics

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I passed the U.S. airbase on the way to the Bishkek airport Tuesday. My landlord's son Sasha was driving, and we talked about Kyrgyz politics during our drive.

"What do you think about the U.S. base?" I asked him.

"Well, I am sure it will stay for awhile," he said. "The Russian base, too. And that's a good thing, if there are terrorists in the mountains."

Kyrgyzstan says it started fighting the war on terrorism before the United States, and recently announced the arrest of members of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.

Evidence is rarely made public, and most alleged members are released soon after their arrests.

Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev has been calling for the United States to pay more for the airbase. At one point last winter, he said he wanted $200 million per year, an effective 100-fold increase. His demands have prompted repeated visits by senior U.S. State Department officials.

In April, shortly before his first state visit to Moscow, Bakiyev threatened to cancel the lease if new terms were not agreed to by June 1.

Days before his deadline, negotiations began. The deadline came and went, and the Kyrgyz Foreign Ministry made a conciliatory announcement, saying that they could not be blamed for taking a lopsided negotiations stance. The presidential press office spoke of renewed instability in Afghanistan and recent violence on the southern Kyrgyz border, and the United States praised Kyrgyzstan as a "strong and dedicated partner in the war on terror." But no new financial terms were announced.

This did not surprise Sasha, who said the real money Kyrgyzstan took in for the base was in fuel contracts. "It lines the authorities' pockets, while pensions are not paid," he said. "And it will always be like that."

Russia has an airbase in Kyrgyzstan, too. During the debate over whether the United States should pay more rent, opposition politicians pointed out that the Russians do not even pay for their electricity.

All the hullabaloo about the U.S. base started with a July 2005 meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. The group called on the United States to set a timeline for withdrawing its troops from Central Asia, implying that the situation in Afghanistan had stabilized.

Sasha's cynical endorsement of the status quo may be tested this week, when the SCO meets in China. It will be Bakiyev's second visit to China in as many weeks, and it will be interesting to see whether he changes his tune.

This is Ethan Wilensky-Lanford's last columnn as a freelance journalist based in Central Asia. He is returning to the United States to begin graduate studies at the Columbia School of Journalism.