Leila posts a story of Murad, a Turkmen player of dutar, on neweurasia Turkmenistan (ENG).

Profet on Russian neweurasia writes on the problems of ethnic interrelations in Central Asia. He offers his vision on how the tensions in Kyrgyz-Uzbek-Tajik relations can be eliminated (RUS).

Here we present a roundup of blogging activity in Kyrgyzstan for the last 2 weeks.

In the blogsphere of Kyrgyzstan different issues has been discussed during these 2 weeks. The emphasis was mainly on politics with different people sharing their opinions about the hot political season in Kyrgyzstan as well as abroad.

Naryn Ayip, who posts regularly in his live journal, talks about the failed negotiations of the Kyrgyz president and oppositional leaders. These negotiations were supposed to be held on October 21st in the Kyrgyz White House, but members of the movement “Supporting Reforms” never showed up, blaming the president for inviting mediators to participate in what was supposed to be a tête-à-tête meeting. Naryn Ayip in his post suggests that apparently both parties are not interested in starting a constructive dialogue. He also points out at one interesting detail: the information about invited mediators was given to the members of the opposition the head of the presidential committee on human rights, a well known trouble maker Tursunbek Akun.

Edil Baysalov, one of the members of the movement “Supporting reforms”, warns on his blog that official power has an intention to stage provocations against the members of the movements in order to discredit Kyrgyz opposition. Baysalov shares the information about unknown people, who approach Bishkek inhabitants, offering money for joining the opposition rally on November 2. Baysalov also mentions the movement “Supporting Reforms” has got some facts about the group of young people, showing up in different supermarkets and shops and warning the owners about possible looting and massacre on November 2.
Baysalov also shares rumors about the Russian tycoon in exile Boris Berezovsky, who, while being wanted by Russian secret services, managed to come to Kyrgyzstan and spend some great time at the Issyk Kul lake. Baysalov states that 3 villagers from Korumdu (small village near the lake) claimed that they Berezovsky, visiting one of the resort houses, owned by the Kyrgyz businessman Shershov.

Mirsulgan Namazaliev also shares his concerns about the rally of the opposition. He quotes the research of the Center of Political Prognosis. The research turns out to be rather detailed with the analysis of the position, resources and the strategy of the political movement “Supporting Reforms”. There are several particularly interesting quotes of the analysis:
1) “Based on the experience of the previous rallies on April 29 and May 27, it is safe to state that the leaders of the opposition movement do posses certain financial and human resources that seem to be sufficient for staging another rally”.
2) “According to the information from the sources that are close to the movement “Supporting Reforms” there is a possibility that this time the rally can also be joined by the sellers from the Dordoy bazaar and by the squatters, who have been occupying the capital of Kyrgyzstan for more than a year.”
3) “Violence outbreaks can potentially occur if the rally is joined by different groups with the high destructive potential since for the activists of the movement “Supporting Reforms” it will be extremely difficult to curb provocateurs”

On the Russian version of neweurasia I posted my comments on the political and social atmosphere in the eve of the rally on November 2. I shared my impression about the strategy of intimidating opponents that is used by both parties of the conflict. As an illustration I talk about the police exercise that was shown by all TV channels in Bishkek. According to the comments of the head of the Ministry of Interior, the exercise had nothing to do with the staged rally. But I emphasize that everything that was happening on the testing sight was a strong déjà vu from March 24, when special forces failed to curb the crowd, storming the White House. I also pick up at the contradictory statements of the leaders of the opposition, who doesn’t seem to have a common position on what is gonna happen on November 2. Thus some of them (Edil Baysalov) keep saying that the rally will remind a peaceful celebration. According to others (Almazbek Atambaev), the rally will be joined by the police on the side of protesters, since official units allegedly has expressed their readiness to shift loyalties.

Leila translates Adam’s post on Kazakhstan’s press feredom situation, according to the annual index by “Reporters Without Borders” (ENG).

Inga in her post writes about the competition of Kazakh and Kyrgyz businessmen for the Kyrgyz financial market (RUS).

2 of November is a day that Kyrgyz opposition chose for its grand rally in Bishkek. Yulia writes how different parties are getting prepared for this event (RUS).

While touring the south of Kyrgyzstan, Kurmanbek Bakiev came up with a number of important statements. Yulia discusses the reasons for the president to go that far to disclose his plane (RUS).

On October 19, Prague’s Lucerna cinema hosted Central Asian gala event within MOFFOM, “Music on Film - Film on Music” festival. The event featured three music documentaries by Uzbek film director Saodat Ismailova: “Revitalizing Shashmaqam, Court Music of Central Asia”, “Homayun Sakhi: The Art Of The Afghan Rubab” and Tengir-Too: Mountain Music Of Kyrgyzstan”. Films were followed by live music performances by Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Tajik and Afghan musicians. The event was well attended, by international and Central Asian audience, who represented vast Czech Central Asian community – staff of the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and students of English language universities in Prague.

“Festival organizer Keith Jones attributes the enthusiasm of the audience to the exotic nature of the music and to outstanding musicianship…There’s also a political side underlying this — that people want to know more, especially in Europe, about the Islamic world , … about secular cultures from Islamic countries because they are sort of attacked in the media with unfair stereotypes. And a lot of people are searching for stories that lie underneath the headlines and underneath what is just on the surface. And so Central Asian music has attracted relatively strong support within a certain community which is interested in world music and international cultures generally”, wrote RFE/RL.

The films were very picturesque and interesting. Read the RFE/RL description of the films:

The film “Revitalizing Shashmaqam, Court Music of Central Asia” offers a glimpse into “shashmaqam” - one of the primary styles of ancient court music that flourished in Silk Road cities of Central Asia like Samarkand, Bukhara, and Tashkent. “Homayun Sakhi: The Art Of The Afghan Rubab” is a detailed portrait of the life and work of a master of Afghan traditional music. Sakhi, the subject of the film, fled his native Afghanistan after the Soviet invasion. But he developed a new musical style while living in exile in Pakistan. Eventually he moved to Fremont, California, a small American town that has a large population of Afghan expatriates. “Tengir-Too: Mountain Music Of Kyrgyzstan,” depicted the relationship between the Kyrgyz people, their traditional music, and the landscape.

I remember one of the characters of the “Tengir-Too”, “komuz” player, told that he grew up in a family where playing komuz was from generation to generation. “We are nomad people”, he said, and historically we played individually, we did not have orchestras. Now that we live in the cities, we still play our traditional music, but in ensembles, in a modern Western way.”

Live performances were vivid and touching: having similar instruments, Central Asian music has different styles. When musicians were playing one after another, there was a feeling that it was not only the Western audience that was getting exposed to different sounds of Central Asia, but also that Central Asians themselves were learning more about each other’s cultures. We were pleased to speak to Murad, a Turkmen musician who played at the event, and publish his story on neweurasia Turkmenistan, available here.

Marat tracks back the history of Karachaganak oil and gas deposit since the 1980s, when it was first discovered (RUS).

Adam Kesher discusses Kazakhstan press freedom following the 2006 Reporters Without Borders survey (RUS).