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The Democracy Conundrum in Central Asia
Apratim Mukarji
Washington's claims to uphold and protect democracy abroad are being put to the test in the strategically important Central Asian region which the US seeks to dominate, in view of its vast energy reserves, openly challenging Russia in its historic backyard but without paying much attention to the dictatorial character of many of the post-Soviet regimes.
Close on the heels of a highly controversial and widely criticised performance in the post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, the foreign policy practitioners of the United States are facing another crucial test, as four of the five Central Asian republics move into the election mode during 2004-05. A host of questions regarding US intentions and achievements in the region will be raised against the backdrop of the elections, calling for satisfactory answers.
Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan have held parliamentary elections this year while Tajikistan will have a new parliament and Kyrgyzstan will choose a new president next year. It is, however, the geopolitical, economic and social factors present in the republics, especially in the wake of the "Revolution of Roses" in Georgia, that combine to present a tough challenge to the United States which has clearly embarked on a high-profile role designed to dominate the strategic region largely at the expense of the Russian Federation.
Ever since Washington turned its attention to the Central Asian republics and the Caucasus, which hold the largest energy reserves in the world, as its next area of dominance after the Middle East following the collapse of the Soviet Union, American oil conglomerates moved in by taking up major stakes, and US diplomacy began to unfurl its wider aim of curbing Russian influence by following twin ostensible goals—the strengthening of democracy and civil society in the region, and facilitating the flow of Central Asian and Caspian Sea energy sources to the West independently of Russia and Iran. The US thrust into the region received a boost many times over with the launch of the global war against terrorism, which soon co-opted the international efforts to fight drug trafficking. All these factors proved to be handy for a steadily burgeoning US role in the region.
These developments took place against the backdrop of the internal instabilities in the Central Asian republics and in the Caucasian republics of Azerbaijan and Georgia. The breakaway republics passed through political turmoil and economic decline while undergoing the pangs of a sudden withdrawal of the traditional Soviet dominance in governance; in fact, the travails of an unfamiliar independence from the Soviet Union continue till today in more ways than one.
There is a general agreement that the Central Asian and Caucasian republics have succeeded in holding on to their territorial integrity with a relative degree of political stability despite the stupendous challenges they faced in the wake of their independence, not ignoring the five years of severe civil strife in Tajikistan, and the continuing movements for ethnic independence and autonomy. The political system the countries have adopted for ensuring political stability, that of the executive presidency, has, however, turned out to be largely a mockery of democracy sometimes verging on an undisguised form of autocracy. Besides, political power continues to be concentrated in the hands of former communists and former communist parties and the political environment, though vastly different from the Soviet era, reminds one strongly of Soviet-style manoeuvres, subterfuges and frequent subversions of the rule of law, including flagrant manipulations of the judicial system. While elections are held regularly, all the countries have been governed virtually by the same coteries led by the same heads of state. While Azerbaijan has opted for the first-ever dynastic rule with Ilham Aliyev, the son of the former President Haider Aliyev, succeeding him in a typical landslide electoral victory, there is adequate evidence to suggest that other regimes in the region are quietly pursuing similar objectives.
In such pursuits, the regimes bank with considerable confidence on their ability to sustain internal stability irrespective of the political, economic and social costs. In the dramatically changed international environment, however, the global war against terrorism and the US-led campaign for greater democracy and liberalisation of economy have served to focus increasing attention on the internal situations in Central Asia and the Caucasus for a reason which is diametrically opposite to the interest shown in Iraq.
While Washington chose to pulverise Iraq in order to get rid of the Saddam Hussein government, it used kid gloves to handle the strategically important Central Asia and the Caucasus. Clearly, the promotion of genuine democracy is not a priority for the Americans here, though there is a quiet hope that democracy will eventually come. The priorities in the region are apparently different; the oil and gas-rich and geopolitically significant countries offer the twin possibilities of ensuring a vast, virtually captive energy-supply source, supplementary to the Middle East, and a potentially effective means of restraining the resurgence of Russia as an economic power.
To appreciate the US policy towards the region, however, it is necessary to take note of the official position. In a detailed presentation of the policy, Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs, Beth Jones told the University of Montana on April 10, 2003, that:
We are working with several local partners—NGOs, civil society organisations, and journalists—to help build democracy from the grassroots up. Under repressive conditions—such as those existing in Turkmenistan—these efforts are mostly aimed at keeping alive hope for long-term change in other countries, though, civil society is increasingly able to act as a real counterweight to arbitrary government behaviour. We saw examples of this in Kyrgyzstan, where NGO pressure led to (the) revocation of a presidential decree limiting freedom of the press. In Tajikistan, the government approved the application of Radio One, the first non-state-run station in Dushanbe. Also in Tajikistan, the government has registered new political parties, simplified political party registration, and made it easier for civil society NGOs to register, leading to an explosion in their numbers. The issue of human rights is, however, the toughest nut to crack. For example, Uzbekistan has serious problems. In Central Asia, poor economic and social conditions are contributing to the appeal of extremist Islam in the volatile Ferghana Valley. Our battle against corruption throughout the region has begun to reap rewards. For example, the United States and the Kyrgyz Government addressed corruption in academia where Communist Party or government influence used to determine admission to universities. At the request of the Kyrgyz Ministry of Education, we developed and funded the first nationwide testing programme for university scholarships. In June 2002, the National Merit Scholarship Test was administered in three languages (Kyrgyz, Uzbek and Russian) to over 14,000 high school scholars. Nowhere else in the former Soviet Union do students receive university scholarships solely on merit. This is a remarkable achievement and has opened opportunities for young people.
Beth Jones continued that:
A thriving opposition is a problem in all the countries in the region. This has been evident even in two of the most successful countries in carrying out reforms, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. Kazakhstan has selectively charged and convicted key opposition leaders for corruption and intimidated independent media outlets and journalists associated with the political opposition. Kyrgyzstan's imprisonment of an opposition parliamentarian led to violence and great instability and recent constitutional changes have tended to concentrate even more power in the hands of the executive. We are working closely with both these governments to turn around these negative trends.
She further added that:
There are serious human rights problems throughout the countries in Central Asia and the Caucasus. For example, in Turkmenistan, we have witnessed a sharp crackdown on the political opposition and society in general since the attack on President Niyazov's motorcade in November. The Government of Turkmenistan arrested a number of political opponents of President Niyazov, all of whom he alleges were involved in the plot. The Turkmen Government did not allow an independent observer from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to visit Turkmenistan to investigate claims of human rights violations, including torture, associated with this crackdown. Despite this bleak picture, we firmly believe that change will come in Turkmenistan. We will not abandon the Turkmen people (Paper entitled "US Engagement in Central Asia and the Caucasus: Staying Our Course Along the Silk Road", Bureau of Public Affairs, US Department of State website, www.state.gov).
When these words are viewed against the Bush administration's harangue on the Saddam Hussein regime, continuing even in the post-Saddam Hussein period, Washington's deliberate patronisation of the Central Asian and Caucasian regimes stands out in a sharp contrast. Since the US administration, in both the Clinton and Bush Jr. periods, has chosen to champion democracy all over the world, it is this dichotomy of glossing over autocracy in the five Central Asian republics and in Azerbaijan (Georgia was included in the category but is no longer so after the ouster of the Eduard Shevardnadze government in November 2003 and the emergence of the pro-US Mikhail Saakashvili regime) that raises uncomfortable questions not only for the US and its allies but also for the larger world community. These questions are indeed being highlighted during the ongoing parliamentary and presidential elections in Central Asia.
It is important to note that in spite of political repression and governmental corruption, coupled with a very poor human rights record, in these states—now bywords in the international community—their governments continue to enjoy virtually unstinted support from all sorts of countries, including India, dictated no doubt by national interests. The all-round support for the regimes is dictated by the vast partially-explored and largely unexplored energy reserves of these countries and their strategic geopolitical locations, as also by their well-proven secularism. The latter factor ensures that these countries will continue to be counted among the strongest supporters of the global war against terrorism.
The US, however, attracts the maximum criticism for soft-pedaling the essentially anti-democratic regimes by virtue of being the solitary superpower and a self-declared champion of democracy, human rights and justice. The criticism has been further fuelled by various manifestations of the contradictions inherent in using different yardsticks for determining autocratic rule. When the reasons for such behaviour are exposed thoroughly, the cynicism of critics around the world is naturally further intensified.
Since such an unvarnished interventionist role with a clear objective of enhancing US interests is being enacted in the very backyard of Russia, in Central Asia and the Caucasus, it is but natural that Moscow has begun to respond aggressively in order to counter Washington effectively and quickly. The result, as many are saying, is a new great power rivalry in the region with unforeseeable consequences.
As Dr Mehrdad Haghayegi, a political scientist at Southwest Missouri State University, said at a conference sponsored by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and the Kennan Institute, held in Washington DC, on September 23, 2003, "The United States has made a significant contribution to the intensification of that rivalry. Basically, you have Russia on the offensive (in Central Asia) partly because of the US pursuit of unilateralism."
Todd Diamond, an American writer, wrote:
The Bush administration's strategic approach in Central Asia has come under criticism from regional experts. The general perception that the United States has acted solely out of self-interest since the September 11 terrorist tragedy has prompted other, regional powers in Central Asia, notably Russia, to take countermeasures, creating an unsettling dynamic. Perhaps the starkest evidence of the US-Russian rivalry in Central Asia is in Kyrgyzstan, where both Washington and Moscow have established military bases outside Bishkek (Eurasia Insight, October 1, 2003).
A scholar of the region, Ehsan Ahrari, wrote on January 18, 2004:
. . . despite the dismantlement of the Taliban rule, the US military campaign in Afghanistan was not finished. But this is a mere technicality for staying in Central Asia, as is now envisioned in Moscow. Fact of the matter is, even if the United States at one time wanted to pull out of Central Asia, it has now concluded to the contrary. In accordance with the grand strategy of fighting [the] global war on terrorism, the Bush administration has adopted a new policy regarding the global basing of its forces, which reflects its overall policy of force projection, transformation and global rapid reaction. The specifics of this policy [require] that a number of bases in different parts of the world would be used to deploy rapid response forces in order to deal with regional contingencies of major and minor import. Central Asia and South Caucasus figure prominently in this force positioning policy.
Examining the impact of this policy on Russia, Ahrari said, "The foremost implication . . . is that Russia must examine this US grand strategy and calculate on a continuing basis how it affects its own strategic presence and interests in its immediate neighbourhood." He underlined one significant factor that is clearly working in favour of the American strategy, namely the desire of the Central Asian and Caucasian countries to exploit the expanding American presence in order to keep Russia under reasonable check so that the optimum benefits from the rivalry between the two powers be available to them. He wrote:
The Russian leaders know only too well, that given America's substantial military and economic primacy, countries of Central Asia and South Caucasus readily prefer the presence of American forces within their borders. Russians are painfully aware of the fact that countries of those regions also prefer American force presence because it will not jeopardise their sovereignty, and it will serve as a guarantee against any potential Russian shenanigans aimed at destabilising them. (Znet/Terror War)
The author of The New Great Game: Blood and Oil in Central Asia (Grove Press, 2004), Lutz Kleveman writes:
This new "Great Game" also explains the Bush administration's intense strategic interest in Georgia, as the country lies on the route of the gigantic $3.8 billion Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline from the Azerbaijani capital Baku to the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan. Currently under construction by a British Petroleum-led international consortium, the pipeline is scheduled to start pumping crude in 2005. Keen to diversify America's oil supplies and to strengthen the ex-Soviet states' independence from Moscow, the Bush administration strongly supports the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline because it circumvents America's rivals Russia and Iran, which offer alternative transit routes across their territories.
Recent developments, however, indicate that the US-Russia rivalry is no longer confined only to intruding on each other's spheres of influence. American advances into the region have begun to endanger Russia's economic rejuvenation and it has clearly become essential for Moscow to confront American threats and secure its backyard with determination.
While the highly controversial arrest of Russia's richest oil magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky was widely covered by the world press, conveying the impression that President Putin had proved to be too intolerant of a weighty critic of his policies, the background to the arrest reveals the extent of the American-Russian tussle for supremacy. It is important to remember that the arrest of the oil magnate brought about two interventions in his favour by US President George W. Bush Jr.
The world press, however, never bothered to find out the actual reason for President Bush's intervention. The intervention came because Washington realised that Mr Khodorkovsky's arrest would eventually jeopardise its carefully laid plan to reduce the Russian Government's influence on the Russian oil and gas exports. If the American plan had succeeded, Russia would have lost a substantial portion of its main revenue earnings, apart from the subsequent loss in political leverage. Mr Khodorkovsky had indeed planned to sell a 40 per cent stake in his company Yukos, Russia's biggest oil producer, to ExxonMobile or ChevronTexaco. President George Bush was so much involved personally in the forthcoming deal that he had sent his father, Bush Sr., to Moscow to ensure that the deal went through. Apart from giving a major stake to a US oil conglomerate in the largest Russian oil company, the deal would have had the effect of converting Russia into a major non-OPEC source of crude which would also have been free of government control. President Putin, therefore, opted for the democratic way of neutralising the situation by bringing in charges of fraud and tax evasion against Mr Khodorkovsky and he tasted sweet revenge when Mr Bush's two telephone calls came. While rejecting the American suggestion for releasing Mr Khodorkovsky, he pointed out that the Yukos case was no different from the Enron case, in which the Bush administration was similarly pursuing fraud and tax evasion charges. (Vladimir Radyuhin, The Hindu, February 11, 2004).
Reports from Moscow speak of a widening public suspicion of American designs, a major factor for the popularity of President Vladimir Putin, who is perceived to be matching American wiles with equal finesse. Reports indicate that President Bush could not respond effectively when President Putin told him following his intervention in the Khodorkovsky case that the Yukos affair was similar to the Enron case and that the richest Russian would certainly stand trial in open court. The champion of democracy could not obviously intervene when democracy was being observed meticulously in Russia!
This brings us back to Washington's deliberate indifference to a number of human rights abuses being perpetrated by the autocratic regimes of Central Asia and the South Caucasus. As a matter of fact, it is fair to guess what would have been the American attitude towards Georgia if the former President Shevardnadze had proved to be as pro-American and allergic to Russia as his successor is said to be. Would the "revolution of roses" have happened then? Even though little has been said on the subject, it is now conclusively established that in a remarkable repeat of the manner in which the former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic fell on October 5, 2000, the shadowy American presence was also behind the toppling of Shevardnadze (Apratim Mukarji and Dr K. G. Tyagi, eds., Assertive Democracy: Transition in Yugoslavia—Selected Documents).
The fall of Shevardnadze, in fact, continues to reverberate in the region. He and Milosovic were clearly unpopular and unwanted towards the end of their respective terms. By the same token, however, there is little reason to hope that similarly autocratic and corrupt leaders will not continue to enjoy their own tenures. Judging by the deliberate dichotomy being practised by Washington and within the dynamics of the heightening American-Russian rivalry, these presidents appear to be blessed with indefinite continuity. As the parliamentary and presidential elections in the four Central Asian republics come to pass, the US in particular will be increasingly called upon to answer uncomfortable questions regarding the ultimate validity of its unbridled pursuit of self-interest, forcing Russia in the process to play an increasingly aggressive and effective role in the region.