Posted by pt2 on 10/9/2004, 19:51:19, in reply to "Analysis: Terror In Uzbekistan" While stressing that they do not share HT's vision for the future of Uzbekistan, human rights groups insist that the government's repressive measures are counterproductive, and that only reform can stem the tide of radicalism. The "Los Angeles Times" quoted Alison Gill, a researcher for Human Rights Watch (HRW), on 17 April as saying, "HT's ideology is not democratic. It's anti-Western, it's anti-Semitic, a lot of it is hateful. It's not that we protect the content of their speech. We protect their right to speech...less repression and more democracy is the way to promote peace and stability in Uzbekistan." Robert Templer, the Asia program director for the International Crisis Group, told the "Ottawa Citizen" on 11 April that the government's anti-HT fervor has victimized ordinary Muslims. He said, "[Imprisoned Islamists are] mostly just people engaged in normal worship and normal expression of political views who didn't advocate anything or do anything violent." A 10 August HRW Briefing Paper on the UN Security Council's approach to human rights violations in the global counterterrorism effort summed up the case, arguing, "In essence, Uzbekistan has criminalized legitimate religious practice and belief in a way that casts individuals' exercise of their rights to freedom of conscience, expression, and association as attempts to overthrow the government. In its report to the [U.S.] Counter-Terrorism Committee, it is characterizing instruments of gross and widespread abuse of human rights as a legitimate counter-terrorism response." Writing in "Foreign Affairs" (Vol. 82, March-April 2003), Charles William Maynes, president of the Eurasia Foundation, carried this argument to its logical conclusion: "HT, despite some objectionable features of its platform, does propose to reach power peacefully. The West should urge the region's leaders to open local government to electoral challenge and to allow all parties seeking peaceful change to take part. Perhaps it will turn out that the radical Islamists enjoy little support. Even if they do garner electoral support, however, Islamic forces may gradually develop a stake in the system, so that when they do finally enter national government, it will constitute an act of inclusion, not revolution." Meanwhile, Central Asian observers of HT have at times suggested that things may not be quite as they seem at first glance. Hoji Akbar Turajonzoda, a representative of "official" Islam during the Soviet period and now a deputy prime minister in the Tajik government, told "Nezavisimaya Gazeta" on 4 August that HT is nothing more than a Western-sponsored bogeyman. 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.'" Turajonzoda's view fits in with a broader conspiratorial strain popular in the post-Soviet world, and nowhere more so than in Russia, where adherents sometimes argue for the existence of a nefarious American-inspired plot to remake Central Asia. To wit, columnist Mikhail Chernov argued in RBCDaily.ru on 4 August that the most recent outbreak of violence in Uzbekistan presages the end of the Karimov regime. He wrote, "Tashkent will come under military pressure from the Islamists, and diplomatic pressure from the United States and international NGOs. In all likelihood, President Karimov will not be able to stay in power.... The fall of the regime in Tashkent will lead to the destabilization of Central Asia." Chernov cited supporting arguments from Aleksandr Sobyanin, director of the Strategic Planning Service in the Association for Border Cooperation: "The pressure will come on three levels -- from the opposition (primarily, the Muslim party of HT based in Kyrgyzstan), American diplomats and American-controlled NGOs, and militants, whose main training camps are in Afghanistan and Pakistan."
There are, however, compelling reasons to treat such reports with caution. For one thing, we lack independent confirmation of the number of HT supporters in Central Asia. (The organization is banned in all countries except Kazakhstan, where it lacks official registration, rendering any activity on its behalf illegal.) More specifically, the "Moskovskii Komsomolets" expose is open to question on several levels. The Russian press in general, and "Moskovskii Komsomolets" in particular, has a marked penchant for poorly sourced sensationalism. Moreover, paid-for placed articles -- known as "zakazukha" -- are a staple in many newspapers. A 9 June 2001 report by "The Moscow Times" described zakazukha as a "multimillion-dollar industry" and cited data from Lobbynet, a press monitoring organization, as indicating that "Moskovskii Komsomolets" raked in $270,000 a month for made-to-order articles. With numerous interested parties keen to demonize HT -- Central Asian governments, for one -- the possibility of a paid-for expose should at least be noted. But even if one takes the report at face value, it seems unlikely that a journalist would be able to infiltrate a truly clandestine organization with such apparent ease and discover details about its military wing and future plans. Such an organization would hardly stand a chance against even the most minimally competent security services. As things stand, without further confirmation, the report alone provides insufficient basis for far-reaching conclusions.
Many observers take an entirely different view of HT, describing the harsh measures the Uzbek government has taken to contain it -- imprisoning, by most accounts, several thousand alleged adherents -- as the root of the problem, rather than the solution. Martha Brill Olcott, a noted specialist on Central Asia at the Carnegie Endowment, wrote in "Demokratizatsiya" (Vol. 11, Winter 2003), "[T]he [Uzbek] government is unrelenting in its attack on HT, Central Asia's most popular radical Islamic group, which has vowed to create an Islamic caliphate in the region through peaceful means. The Uzbek government is behaving much as did its Soviet predecessors, believing that it can dampen the fires of religious fervor through state regulation of religious practice and pushing extremist groups underground through its efforts. Given Uzbekistan's current demographic and social situation, the potential for new recruits remains high."
Message Thread:
« Back to thread