[CivilSoc] Uzbek Bridge--Humanitarian Aid Route--Remains Closed

[Civil Society International]

This item is an abbreviated version of a story appearing in:
Johnson's Russia List
#5570
28 November 2001
A CDI Project
www.cdi.org
#13
Uzbekistan Refuses to Open Bridge
November 28, 2001
By GEORGE GEDDA
WASHINGTON (AP) - The government of Uzbekistan has irked U.S. officials by
refusing to open a bridge that could become a lifeline to an estimated 3
million hungry people in Northern Afghanistan.
Trucks could carry 15,000 tons of food across the bridge each month, but
U.N. officials are reduced to making deliveries by barge. The process takes
time, something the hapless Afghans lack, especially with the onset of
winter.
The Uzbeks worry that if the bridge is opened, Taliban militants could use
it to escape into Uzbekistan, which would cause security problems. The State
Department says an Uzbek rebel group has links with alleged terrorist
mastermind Osama Bin Laden's al-Qaida network.
Getting cooperation on the humanitarian aid front in Afghanistan, as well as
in the overall anti-terrorism campaign, has not been easy for the Bush
administration.
Few countries are able to give all-out support. Many show their support in
undramatic, politically uncontroversial ways, such as by sharing
intelligence or freezing terrorists' assets.
But as the administration has implied on many occasions, it would be a
mistake to ask friendly countries to act in ways that could be politically
destablilizing...
... the United States and Uzbekistan are in the getting-to-know-you stage,
and the process has not been easy. Uzbekistan has not loomed large on the
U.S. priority list in recent years. In normal times, the country wouldn't
get a second glance. But as a neighbor of Afghanistan, California-sized
Uzbekistan has been emerging from its previous obscurity.
Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumseld has visited the country twice since
Sept. 11, and news reports - the State Department won't comment - say
Secretary of State Colin Powell is due there in early December.
The United States already has some 1,000 troops in Uzbekistan. Although the
former Soviet republic has balked at allowing the United States to hit
Afghanistan from Uzbek bases, it has agreed that soldiers can be based on
its territory for search-and-rescue and humanitarian missions.
The two countries now are acquainted enough to argue. Besides the spat over
the bridge along the Afghan border, they are at odds over aid levels.
Powell promised the Uzbeks significant foreign aid, but the two sides are
said to be far apart. A senior Uzbek delegation is in Washington this week
to discuss the problem.
Lurking beneath the surface in the relationship is human rights. The
International Crisis Group, which monitors global hot spots, says
Uzbekistan's human rights record is ``often abysmal.''
The pro-democracy group Freedom House ranks Uzbekistan among the world's
least-free countries. It says opposition candidates were barred from
competing in January's election against the longtime president, Islam
Karimov.
It added that an alternate candidate who was allowed to run voiced support
for the incumbent's policies and even said that he himself intended to vote
for Karimov.