KYRGYZSTAN: US base gets reprieve

At a joint press conference with visiting US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld on July 26, Kyrgystan's defence minister announced that his government would continue to allow Washington to station around 1000 US military personnel at an airport near the capital, Bishtek. On July 5, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation - a regional security alliance between Russia, China and four Central Asian states including Kyrgystan — had demanded that the US begin withdrawing its military personnel from Central Asia. Rumsfeld rushed to Bishtek after Kyrgyz President-elect Kurmanbek Bakiyev also called on Washington to set a deadline for withdrawing its soldiers from the Manas airbase. During the election campaign, Bakiyev, who won a landslide almost 90% of the votes cast, repeated the SCO call for a deadline for the US presence. According to the Russian Novosti news agency, Washington pays about US$52 million a year to the cash-strapped Kyrgyz government for the use of the base, which it says is plays a major role in US military operations in Afghanistan.

From Green Left Weekly, August 3, 2005.

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From GLW issue 636