Police cracked down on protests in Kyrgyzstan yesterday, with the opposition saying at least 142 people were detained in rallies against a “stolen” election in the volatile Central Asian country.
The swift response indicated that the Kyrgyz government would not tolerate street actions pledged by the opposition, which has alleged massive fraud in the landslide re-election victory of President Kurmanbek Bakiyev.
It was also the latest episode in a long-running history of political instability in Kyrgyzstan, an impoverished ex-Soviet republic which is home to a key US military base.
PHOTO: AFP
In one protest in the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek, opposition supporters shouted slogans such as “Return the stolen power!” and were about to march on the presidental palace when police moved in, an Agence France-Presse (AFP) journalist witnessed.
Protesters were dragged away into buses. Police also attempted to detain the AFP journalist, apparently confusing her for one of the protesters.
The protesters “were detained today for violations of public order. They did not have permission to carry out the march and the meeting in Bishkek,” said Gulya Kozhamkulova, prosecutor for the city’s Lenin district.
Opposition spokesman Ulan Manayev said that the march was a “peaceful protest” and put the number of people arrested there at 80.
Initial reports said 200 people were arrested at the march, but Manayev said that many people there turned out to be plainclothes police masquerading as demonstrators, who helped arrest opposition supporters.
A total of 142 people were arrested at various protests in and around Bishkek, Manayev said, adding that other people were being arrested at protests throughout the country.
The number could not be immediately confirmed with the authorities.
The demonstrators were supporters of Almazbek Atambayev, the main opposition candidate in last Thursday’s disputed election in the ex-Soviet republic. Incumbent president Bakiyev won the election with 76.43 percent of the vote compared with 8.39 percent for Atambayev, according to official results that are disputed by the opposition.
Western observers from the Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe also criticized the election, citing widespread irregularities.
Impoverished Kyrgyzstan has a history of political unrest. Bakiyev himself came to power after a popular uprising in 2005 that ousted his predecessor, Askar Akayev.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion