Articles tagged with: Andijan sanctions
Image by UZNEWS.net.
Editor’s note: In the wake of Islam Karimov’s visit to Brussels earlier this week, the European Union is seeming pretty impotent in the face of one of the world’s most brutal dictatorships. But that’s because the EU isn’t engaging Uzbekistan’s other players, argues neweurasia’s Schwartz. Cross-posted and slightly revised from neweurasia’s partner-site, Transitions Online. Also, be sure to read an open letter to the EU published by neweurasia’s Mirsulzhan and guest blogger Bruno de Cordier’s remarks on a Hizb ut-Tahrir protest on the day of Karimov’s visit.
In the wake of Uzbek President Islam Karimov’s visit to Brussels this week, there’s been lots of acrimonious shouting in the West about what the European Union shouldn’t do about human rights abuses in Uzbekistan, but not much about what it should. That’s because few want to face a grim reality: a fracturing of Uzbekistan’s political elite is probably the best hope for a chance to promote human rights, civil society, and liberal democracy. Seizing that chance, however, would require a taste for realpolitick and risk.
Editor’s note: Uzbekistan’s President Islam Karimov is meeting with European Union officials today in Brussels on a visit that human rights and civil society activists are describing as a secretive affair. 197 organizations and individuals from around the world have signed a letter of protest to the EU, and neweurasia’s Mirsulzhan has a message for Brussels: “Europe, this is the monstrous individual whom you’ve welcomed into Brussels today. In the name of justice, the world beseeches you to confront him!”
The letter and signatories are included at the bottom of this post. Also, make sure to check out this post urging the EU to help a jailed Uzbek journalist, as well as neweurasia’s coverage of the controversial decision to lift the Andijan sanctions.
Today, Uzbekistan’s President, Islam Karimov, will visit Brussels, where he plans to meet with the leadership of the European Union (EU) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), as well as with King of Belgium, Albert II. And yet human rights activists and friends of civl society in Uzbekistan learned about this visit not from the EU or Belgium, but via private channels. This speaks to not only the secrecy that surronds Uzbekistan’s dictatorship, but also the embarassment of Europe, a free society interacting with one of the world’s harshest regimes.
Then, only a few days ago, the website of the President of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, posted the announcement, “Meeting with the President of Uzbekistan, Islam Karimov, with a link to official Uzbek governmental biography of Karimov that includes the unapologetically propagandistic statement, “For his outstanding contribution to education in Uzbekistan, creation of a state based on democratic laws, guarantee of civil peace and national accord, and for courage, [Islam] Karimov was awarded the title Hero of Uzbekistan and the awards Mustakillik [Independence] and Amir Temur.” After we made this embarrassing link public, the Public Affairs Unit of the European Commission deleted it from the Commissioner’s web site.
Amidst all this, several disturbing consequences of European actions, real and potential, stand out: first, the EU’s relations with the Karimov regime violate its own principles of openness; second, Karimov’s secret visit risks setting a precedent for other dictators who wish to have less-than-candid relations with the EU; and finally, that Karimov’s meetings with EU ministers are unlikely to be substantively confrontational about his regime’s human rights and press track record.
Translation of Mashrab’s post (RUS)
Five years after the violent dispersal of protesters in Andijan, it is clear that the wounds have not yet healed. People still remember, no matter how hard the government tries to block the flow of information in and out of the country. Unfortunately, the ranks of those openly dissatisfied with the brutal suppression of the people’s will are thinning each year. Those who reached their “boiling point” in May 2005, and wagged their finger at the president, have either forgotten where their political priorities lie – even though they talk about them all the time – or have been swept aside, lacking the power to influence the haggling that goes on between the international community and the Uzbek White House.
John McCain, visiting Uzbekistan after 29 May 2005, warned: Read the full story »
When Westerners looks at Uzbekistan, do they remember Neville Chamberlain? Photograph in the public domain.
Editor’s note: neweurasia’s bloggers and readers have been debating the recent decision by the European Union to lift the Andijan sanctions from Uzbekistan. Schwartz adds his opinion to the debate, this time from a Westerner’s point of view. (Cross-posted from neweurasia’s affiliate site, Transitions Online.)
Time and again, Uzbekistan holds a mirror up to the West. Consider the recent seismic shift in the European Union (EU)’s stance toward the country’s ruler, Islam Karimov, and his regime.
Brussels may not be so hopeless after all. Image of the Atomium by Flickr user skywaaker (CC-usage).
Editor’s note: neweurasia reported last week on the decision of EU Council to lift its last sanctions on the government of Uzbekistan. These sanctions were imposed after the tragic events in Andijan in May 2005. neweurasia’s Pravdin gets reactions from international organizations on the ground in Uzbekistan. What he finds may surprise you.
My neweurasia colleague Musafirbek has posted a comprehensive round-up on the global press’s reaction to the news that the EU is lifting the last of the Andijan sanctions on Uzbekistan. He’s been slamming the EU for moral bankruptcy, but perhaps Brussels is not so hopeless after all.
Moral darkness is settling upon Brussels. Photograph of Congresstraat by Flickr user Wave Cult (CC-usage).
Editor’s note: neweurasia reported last week on the decision of EU Council to lift its last sanctions on the government of Uzbekistan. These sanctions were imposed after the tragic events in Andijan in May 2005. neweurasia’s Musafirbek presents a round-up of reactions from prominent media organizations both online and off. For an alternative view, check out Pravdin’s post on reactions from international organizations on the ground in Uzbekistan.
As you can imagine, the international human rights community went ballistic on the EU when news broke about Brussels’ decision to lift the Andijan sanctions. Human Rights Watch (HRW), Amnesty International, Russia-based Memorial, and local human rights organizations all expressed their concern and opposed the removal of the sanctions, calling it an “unjustified friendly move towards one of the most offensive dictatorships”. But they were not alone. The global press, both online and off, were also furious. Read the full story »
The Justus Lipsius building, which houses the European Union Council of Ministers. Residents of Brussels often refer to this area of their city as the "European ghetto". Considering the Council's decision on Tuesday to lift the last sanctions on Uzbekistan, perhaps they're right! Photograph by Flickr user TPCOM (CC-usage).
On 27 October 2009, the Council of the European Union (EU) announced that it is lifting its last (and mostly symbolic) sanctions on the government of Uzbekistan which were imposed after the tragic Andijan event of May 2005.
Amazingly, the Council’s members made the decision without a preliminary discussion. Afterward, they stated their reason:
Since the adoption of the EU Strategy for a New Partnership with Central Asia in May 2007, the dialogue and cooperation between the EU and Uzbekistan have acquired a new scope and quality…
And check this out: paragraph #6 of the Counci’ls decision says,
With a view to encourage the Uzbek authorities to take further substantive steps to improve the rule of law and the human rights situation on the ground, and taking into account their commitments, the Council decides not to renew the remaining restrictive measures set out in the Common Position 2008/843/CFSP.
Oh, but wait, the Council isn’t totally heartless to the plight of Uzbekistan’s oppressed population:
[A]t the same time, the EU remains seriously concerned about the human rights situation in Uzbekistan, and encourages the Uzbek authorities to implement fully its international obligations in this area.
Huh?
The Andijon events of May 2005, when several hundred of demonstrating civilians were reportedly shot dead by the Uzbek government troops, made the whole world tremble. The results did take long to come. The United States made several statements on severe human rights violations in Uzbekistan, for which later were asked to call back the Karshi-Khanabad airbase, and EU has put several sanctions, including visa bans on high ranking Uzbek officials. However, today, after three years have passed, both US and EU seem to have forgotten Andijon. Read the full story »
The New Yorker has a profile of Paul Wolfowitz, erstwhile neocon and now President of the World Bank (but not for much longer, maybe …). Few people divide opinion quite like Wolfowitz, but he didn’t shy away from cutting off funds to Uzbekistan following Andijan (h/t: Oxblog). This was in line with his own beliefs about transparency in lending:
‘Under the World Bank’s articles of agreement, it is prohibited from interfering in politics. For many years, this stricture was taken to mean that the bank shouldn’t discuss the bribery and graft that afflicted many of the bigges beneficiaries of its aid. In 1996, James Wolfensohn, Wolfowitz’s predecessor, violated this taboo by publicly referrin to the “cancer of corruptionâ€? in developing countries. Two years later, the bank’s research department published a influential paper, “Assessing Aid,â€? which argued that aid is effective only when it is given to countries with hones governments and efficient economic policies
Wolfowitz was determined to follow Wolfensohn’s lead. In one of his first board meetings, he asked, “Why are we lending to Cambodia? It’s such a corrupt country.â€? Previous bank presidents, including Wolfensohn, had been reluctant to cut off lending, for fear of harming the people whom the bank’s projects were intended to help. Wolfowitz wasn’t persuaded by this argument—according to some estimates, up to twenty per cent of economic aid is misused or stolen—and a few months after he arrived at the bank he appointed Suzanne Rich Folsom as head of the Department of Institutional Integrity, the bank’s internal-investigations unit, which follows up allegations of fraud in bank projects.’
Subsequently, when Uzbekistan popped up on the radar and decisions had to be made about whether or not to lend, Wolfowitz brought down the guillotine:
‘Before long, Wolfowitz became personally involved in the anti-corruption campaign. In September of 2005, he told a reporter for the Financial Times, “I think I feel even more strongly than before that you can’t talk intelligently about development if you exclude anything that sounds political.â€? That May, the government of Uzbekistan had violently suppressed an uprising in the city of Andijan, in which as many as seven hundred people, including women and children, were killed. In July, Islam A. Karimov, Uzbekistan’s dictatorial ruler, ordered the United States to remove its troops and aircraft from the Uzbek base it had been using to support the military campaign in Afghanistan. Around the same time, the Uzbek government expelled a number of Western nongovernmental organizations. Since joining the World Bank, in 1992, Uzbekistan had received more than five hundred million dollars in loans, mostly for rural water and health projects. In September, 2005, Wolfowitz withdrew an assistance package for Uzbekistan that was about to be presented to the bank’s board for approval. “It came out of the blue,â€? Dennis de Tray, who was country director for central Asia at the time, told me. “I got a call while I was on vacation and was told that he just did it. He didn’t even talk to the regional vice-president. We were all pretty shell-shocked.â€? Wolfowitz told me that his action had nothing to do with military bases or the U.S. government. “Nobody was instructing me to get out of Uzbekistan,â€? he said. “My one concern, pure and simple, was that, given the human-rights violations, we couldn’t have any confidence in what was happening to our money.â€?
Nathan at Registan has blogged regularly on the EU’s diplomatic relations with Central Asia (latest post here), but arguably the most active links were those between the international financial bodies (World Bank, IMF, EBRD etc) and the region’s governments. Now they won’t touch Uzbekistan with a barge pole and EU diplomats are headed in the same direction. Are we witnessing a de facto isolation of Uzbekistan?
Alain Deletroz of International Crisis Group (ICG) has written a fairly fierce condemnation of EU-Uzbek relations for European Voice. With the three-monthly review of sanctions imposed in November 2006 due imminently, and the EU apparently considering a ‘softer’ approach towards Central Asia (as Nathan at Registan reported recently), Mr Deletroz poses some blunt questions:
‘But has any good news reached us from Uzbekistan in the meantime? Has the repression of journalists, human rights defenders or non-governmental organisation members softened? Has the situation in the prisons, in the court rooms – where allegations of torture are never taken into account – improved? Or in the cotton fields, where children are obliged to work in conditions close to slavery? Has the level of small, daily humiliations Uzbeks must swallow from the heavy-handed police in any way diminished? And has the government accepted that a credible independent commission can investigate in Andijan as the EU has demanded from the beginning?’
Mr Peretz urges the EU not to back down on the issue of sanctions, and concludes:
‘The foreign ministers should not shame Europe on 5-6 March by lifting sanctions that might be weak but still send a powerful message to Karimov and all who attempt to behave like him in the region. Softening them now would be a different kind of message, one from a very ‘soft power’ indeed.’
Hmmm. It’s a bit like those letters to British newspapers from ‘Disgusted of Tonbridge Wells’, muttering ‘something must be done!’ but without offering any constructive alternatives. It is also indicative of an attitude of ‘one rule for some – one rule for others’ as the e-mail from ICG which alerted me to this piece also carries news of an Middle East briefing paper (No. 21), titled Iran: Ahmadi-Nejad’s Tumultuous Presidency, which states in its overview:
‘By signalling its openness to broad engagement with Iran without preconditions on the nuclear issue, Iraq and bilateral relations, the U.S. would be rendering a far greater and wiser service both to itself and to the region as a whole.’
I appreciate the differences between Iran and Uzbekistan, between the USA and EU, between human rights* and the nuclear issue – but if the ICG is urging the US to negotiate with Iran (on whom it has imposed sanctions) then surely the EU can also negotiate with Uzbekistan, on whom it has, er, imposed sanctions?
ps. I appreciate it may be unfair to compare Mr Deltroz’s think-piece with a totally unrelated briefing paper, but I feel it is a valid comparison, and one worth discussing.
*As if the current Iranian regime has a great record in that area! pah! … and the EU has always prided itself on its ‘constructive dialogue’ with Tehran.
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