Robert Blake: “Non-lethal Afghan-bound military cargoes are crossing Uzbekistan”

The following article is reprinted with permission from Ferghana News Agency.
 

Robert Blake:  “Non-lethal Afghan-bound military cargoes are crossing Uzbekistan”
©  Ferghana
February 18, 2011

The U.S. Embassy in Uzbekistan hosted a news conference on 18 February 2011 with the participation of U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Robert O. Blake, Jr. following his visit to Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

Touching upon the issue of Afghanistan, Mr Blake said a political solution must be found for the current situation in Afghanistan. He reminded that a NATO session in Lisbon in November 2010 discussed a gradual transfer of security provision to afghan national forces, i.e. local law enforcing agencies, military, etc.

“American troops will withdraw from this country only when the transfer is complete. At the moment we are planning to reach that point in 2014,” Mr Blake told journalists.

In response to a question on his opinion about using the Uzbek territory for transiting military cargo to Afghanistan, he said “all the military-affiliated cargoes, which are currently crossing the territory of the Republic of Uzbekistan, are non-lethal.”

“I would also like to express my gratitude to the government of Uzbekistan for making it possible,” Mr Blake asserted.

Mr Blake has briefly mentioned a bilateral intergovernmental session on Thursday and said it was a successful one. According to Mr Blake, issues pertaining to cooperation in the field of security, economy, politics, and scientific and technical cooperation were discussed during the meeting. Mr Blake said human rights and civil society in Uzbekistan were part of the conversation.

Journalists asked Mr Blake to provide more details concerning the Uzbek-American discussions on human rights issues, but Mr Blake only said “a productive discussion took place in this regard.”

“We touched upon many specific issues. In particular, we discussed President Karimov’s recent speech when he expressed Uzbekistan’s hope and aspiration to develop civil society and freedom of press. We also discussed such important issues as freedom of faith and human trafficking. The U.S. delegation proposed assistance in resolving these this year.”

Ferghana International News Agency

[End.]

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STANISLAV MISHIN: How the Muslim Brotherhood Saved the U.S. Dollar

The following column is reprinted with permission from Stanislav Mishin, a regular contributor to Russian newspaper Pravda.
 

How the Muslim Brotherhood Saved the U.S. Dollar
©  Stanislav Mishin
Source:  Mat Rodina
January 30, 2011

There are two truths that the Anglo Elites know all too well: democracy in the West means a ruling oligarchy with good PR, democracy in the Middle East means Islamic Jihadists and Fundamentalists. This has been a fact for many years and is not, in any way a shock or disconnect for any of the American elites now backing “democracy” revolutions.

1.  Iranian revolution, 1978-1979: Mass protests by a wide coalition against the King. Result? Mullahs take over.

2.  Egypt has free parliamentary elections. Results? The Muslim Brotherhood becomes the second most powerful party in the country, before being quickly banned.

3.  Americans allow free elections in Iraq. Results? Islamist parties become the main power blocks in power.

4.  Palestinians have free elections: Voters protest against corrupt regime. Result? Hamas is now running the Gaza Strip.

5.  Beirut Spring: Christians, Sunni Muslims, and Druze unite against Syrian control. Moderate government gains power. Result? Hezbollah is now the main political force in Lebanon.

6.  Algeria holds free elections: Voters back moderate Islamist group. Result? Military coup; Islamists turn (or reveal their true thinking) radical; tens of thousands of people killed.

Quite simply, the majority of the population has an insane infatuation with extremist Islam, be it Shiite or Sunni. Again, none of this is a surprise to the owners of the Anglo sphere. So why are they so actively backing revolutions and over throws throughout the Middle East?

Already a revolution has swept out the sectarian dictator of Tunisia, with Islamists quickly moving in. Exiled leader of Tunisian Islamist party returning to role in ‘new era of democracy’.

Protests, demonstrations and revolutions have now spread to Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Albania, Yemen and Saudi Arabia. Egypt is by far, the worst hit, with the government teetering, mass looting and violence becoming the norm and the Muslim Brotherhood riding high.

All of this, of course is nothing new, it is a rehash of past and present events. So, my astute readers are now asking, again, why are the Anglo Elites servicing these revolutions and how will this save the U.S. dollar, or at least stave off its death for a few more years?

To answer that one must understand that to be a vassal, er, an ally of the Anglos is worse than to be an enemy. At least an enemy knows where he stands, while an ally will be used and when his or her utilization has reached its max, will be betrayed, back stabbed and sold out as best suits the Anglos, be it an Irishman or a Half Arab who sits in the Oval Office.

So now the time has come for a new round of betrayals, to prop up the USD at the expense of allies. You see, dear reader, the U.S. dollar is the exchange currency for Oil and Gas and the higher the price, the more the USD is demanded. The more that is demanded, to buy the more expensive oil and gas, the more debt currency the U.S. private Federal Reserve gets to print up and drop off on the world, allowing for accumulation of real resources, worth real value, as well as continuing pointless Marxist programs and the off-shoring of American hyper inflation to the rest of humanity.

This is nothing new. The U.S. ‘colour revolutions’ were used in the Central Asian states, to create havoc in areas adjacent to oil. The first was in Uzbekistan, where the socialist dictator and U.S. ally, Karimov, has been designated for removal by a U.S.-sponsored Islamic revolution. Unfortunately for the Americans, Karimov had no problem massacring the American paid for revolutionaries. He followed this by ousting the U.S. base on his lands and running to Moscow for protection.

The U.S. dollar did not get its intended boost in the Central Asian territories, at that time, however, the Americans did not give up. Even if a revolution fails in the directly affected area, one can be staged in an adjacent area which will lead to further instability in the intended area, thus driving up the price of oil and gas. To that end, the Americans created and backed the civil war in Tajikistan, where Uzbeki fanatics, in the south of the country now have defacto rule and will export their jihad to their own mother country, thus ensuring high levels of instability for decades to come.

To that same end, the Americans are backing the revolutions on the periphery of the main oil fields of the Middle East, in full knowledge that this will spill further and further into the oil producing regions. That is the plan, after all.

Tunisia, itself, a small time oil producer, accounts for 40,000 barrels/day.

Algeria and Yemen have also faced mass protests, funded and organized by Western NGOs, even as the owners of those NGOs pretend to be sympathetic to the rulers of the countries in question. However, as in Uzbekistan, these rulers have and will continue to respond with massive force, making sure that their U.S.-sponsored, home grown Islamics do not get very far. In Yemen, early Sunday, the government arrested Tawakul Karman, a prominent journalist and member of the Islamist party Isiah. He had organized protests through text messages and emails. All of the Western press are playing their roll, screaming to the high heavens about this Islamic fundamentalist’s follow on release and her love of freedom, even though Fundamentalist Islam believes in Sharia and has no freedom, other than the right to murder unbelievers.

Jordan, one of the most stable regional powers, has also been rocked by protests, as more than 5,000 people took to the streets, demanding the King give up his power, to “the people”.

Egypt has not been so lucky. Its government has proven, so far, to be weak, with many in the military openly siding with the Islamic Brotherhood and its Western NGO backers. Looting in the streets is rampant, as is direct confrontation with those special police forces, and special forces, still loyal to the dictatorship. The end is only a matter of time.

Egypt itself is responsible for the production of 680,000 barrels of oil per day. While this is about 1-2% of the world total output, Egypt further plays a massive role, with the Suez Canal and the alternate Surned pipeline, of passing an additional 1 million barrels of crude bound for the European and American markets. It is bad enough with the Somali pirates pushing up the price of oil, or why do you think that a trigger-happy America willing to invade just about anyone it can, including once upon a time Somalia, suddenly is too timid to deal with a bunch of rag tag pirates?

Other protests have erupted in Morocco, Libya, Lebanon and even Albania. All around the edges of the major oil players.

More worrisome than disruptions to Egypt’s oil production is the prospect that the unrest spreads to other hard-line states in the region, such as Libya and Algeria, both members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). Other countries in the region, including Tunisia and Yemen, have been wracked by anti-government protests in recent weeks, though neither is a major oil producer.

“If this thing spreads across the North African continent, gets into Libya, Algeria, then you’ve got trouble,” said Stephen Schork, editor of the Schork Report energy newsletter.

Finally, this whole process is now spilling into Saudi Arabia and soon possibly into the whole of the Gulf princedoms. The oil shocks will be profound and will be quick.

Already, with just the Egyptian upheavals, and as expected, just on the Thursday and Friday violence, oil went up over 4%, some $3.70 per barrel. Another similar rise can be expected this week, if not higher. When, not if, Mubarak’s government falls, oil should be expected to hit close to the $100 mark. With Nigeria also sinking into civil war, oil may well peak over $100/barrel by the end of February.

The American media and their other Western underlings and affiliates, are doing their part in colouring these as peoples’ fights for freedom and human rights. Of course they know full well what this will lead to: Islamic fundamentalism, which is the only result that this has ever led to. Then when this happens, when the correct end result is in place, those very same self-serving hypocrites, will throw up their hands and declare that they are shocked that those stupid, dirty Arabs could not make any go of “freedom” even after all the help they were given.

The Americans have been preparing for this for years. Many foolishly blame this on Obama, he is a part of this, but his is only the final chapter in the preparation for one of the last ditch efforts to stave off Judgment Day of the U.S. dollar and its debt built and house of cards economy.

“What happened in Georgia with the Rose Revolution and Orange Revolution in Ukraine in 2003-2004 was part of a long-term strategy orchestrated by the Pentagon, the State Department and various U.S.-financed NGOs like Freedom House and National Endowment for Democracy to create pro-NATO regime change in those former Soviet Union areas and to literally encircle Russia,” author and researcher William Engdahl told RT.

“What is going on in the Middle East with the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia that we saw a few days ago, and now in Egypt with Mubarak in his 80s, and obviously a regime that is not exactly the most stable one, we have a food crisis taking place as a backdrop and the IMF coming and telling these countries to eliminate their state food subsidies so you have, of course, the explosive background for popular unrest. Within that you have these NGOs, like Freedom House, training activists and trade unions and various other organizations to demand democracy, demand human rights and so forth,” he added.

This earlier report by RT [“TV Novosti”] sums the process up even better:

Dr. William Robinson is one of the foremost experts on Washington’s democracy promotion initiatives, he wrote the book ‘Promoting Polyarhcy.’

“In Latin America, in Eastern Europe with the Velvet Revolutions, in Africa, in the Middle East, really all over the world, the U.S. set up these different mechanisms now for penetrating these civil societies in the political systems of countries that are going to be intervened and to assure the outcome is going to be pleasing to Washington’s foreign policy objectives,” said Robinson.

Lawrence Wilkerson, the former Chief of Staff to former Secretary of State Colin Powell said, “We do this through surrogates and non-governmental organization and through people who are less suspecting of the evil that may lurk behind their actions than perhaps they were before. Have we learned some lessons in that regard? You bet! Do we do it better? You bet! Is it still just as heinous as it has always been? You bet!”

The Americans call this process Creative Destruction, that is the new catch phrase for world revolutions, no different than that which was exported from our own country while it was ruled by Anglo financed Marxists. While the PR may be promising and alluring, the results will be misery and death for those in ground zero: with tourism and industry fleeing fundamentalist regimes, resulting in yet more starvation and poverty, and a massive enrichment for the top 1% of the Anglo elite who could not give a bigger damn, no matter what their fully owned media mouth pieces may be saying.

The massive increases in the price of oil, as well as the increased demand for weapons by those states who border these areas, will line the pockets of thousands of executives and politicians in America, and to a smaller level, of England, for decades to come. If a war or three are spawned from this, even better.

Furthermore, with refugees and terrorism flooding Europe, which is finally starting to react violently to the virus that is attacking the body social at large, and the confiscation of European industry in Northern Africa, the Euro will be on the front lines of these new Islamic plagues, like never before. It will take another beating, with the dollar remaining a “safe” investment. Just another big plus, not to mention the new missions for NATO and that military-industrial complex, this will generate.

As for the American serfs, the little people? Well, the $6-10/gallon ($1.50-$2.25/liter) gasoline will crush them. Sure, the socialist welfare programs that their government will finance by selling yet more dollars, will help some, but it is a mild treatment for a terminal disease. Their falling wages, in the face of mass and growing unemployment as well as soaring inflation, will drag the last of the middle class into poverty and slavery. However, unlike the Arabs or the French or most other people of the world, they will do what their British cousins have been doing for the past 30 years, put up a stiff upper lip and accept this as their reality. And yes, as before, for the world at large, their owners in NYC, DC and London, could not really give a bigger damn.

A passive people, believing in their own illusionary freedoms and high on their own self importance, make for the best slaves and no where are there more such slaves than in the USA.

The rest of us will also have to live with an ever more violent world, courtesy of the biggest sponsor of Islamic insanity the world has ever had the sorry state of knowing.

[End.]

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An Extremist Link Between Tajikistan, Waziristan

The following article is reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington D.C. 20036.
 

An Extremist Link Between Tajikistan, Waziristan
©  RFE/RL
By Bruce Pannier
January 27, 2011

RFE/RL’s Tajik Service has been tracking a shadowy figure who may be a key link between Pakistan’s tribal region and Central Asia, and at the same time a person who may prove the evolution of one of Central Asia’s most notorious terrorist groups.

His name is Domullah Amriddin, and as the first part of his name suggests he is more than a mere mullah, he is an Islamic scholar. He was also a member of the Islamic wing of Tajikistan’s opposition during the 1992-97 civil war. And like other former civil war fighters who have been in the news in Tajikistan often lately, Domullah did not agree with the peace deal the Tajik government and opposition reached in 1997.

Domullah wanted to continue fighting and turn Tajikistan into an Islamic state. There were wartime allies — Uzbeks — who were forming their own group with a similar goal for Uzbekistan. They became the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) and Domullah joined them.

When IMU members were deported from Tajikistan to Afghanistan in late 1999, Domullah was aboard the Russian Border Guard helicopters that transported them south, part of a desperation deal the Tajik government struck with the IMU to get them out of Tajikistan. Also on one of those helicopters was IMU leader Juma Namangani.

Namangani and Domullah were in Afghanistan’s northern Kunduz Province in November 2001 when the United States bombed the area, decimating IMU forces there and killing Namangani. As the story goes, Domullah was so high up in the IMU by that time that there was talk of making him the new leader. But as military specialist Amrullo Sobir told RFE/RL’s Tajik Service, Domullah was not suited to head the IMU because “the leader should be an Uzbek.”

“So,” he said, “the Islamic Movement of Turkestan was created.”

The existence of the Islamic Movement of Turkestan (IMT) — under which Turkestan refers to the swath of land from the Caspian Sea to the eastern borders of Xinjiang Province in modern-day China — has been debated for years. There have been reports out of Pakistan that said after the IMU was chased, now leaderless, from Afghanistan into Pakistan the group split into three groups. The IMU remained, although stuck and fighting in Waziristan, committed to overthrowing Uzbekistan’s government and also remained a core Uzbek group.

The Islamic Jihad Union widened its scope and set its sights on areas as far away as Europe. Several members of that group were arrested in Germany for plotting terrorist attacks. The IMT stayed focused on Central Asia and attempted to broaden its membership among the peoples of Central Asia, including not only Uzbeks and Tajiks but also Kyrgyz, Uyghurs, and other indigenous peoples of the region. At least that is what the small amount of information available on these groups and their recent movements indicates.

According to information coming out of Tajikistan, including that of Tajik military specialist Sobir, Domullah is responsible for sending Mullo Abdullo, another ally from the Tajik civil war days and friend of the IMU, to eastern Tajikistan in 2009. Tajik security forces have been chasing Mullo Abdullo through Tajikistan’s eastern mountains ever since. In the course of the hunt close to 100 Tajik servicemen and police have been killed, including the 28 killed in an ambush in September. Tajik authorities blame Mullo Abdullo, for the ambush.

Sobir said Domullah and Taliban chief Mullah Mohammad Omar are close and that together the two probably made the decision to send Abdullo north.

Domullah’s name had not come up for some time. While these tales could be dismissed as pure conjecture it is also true that there are no credible sightings of Mullo Abdullo or Mullah Omar recently, yet Tajik authorities are searching for Abdullo and Pakistani and Afghan authorities for Mullah Omar.

[End.]

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Radical Islam attacks Central Asia

The following commentary is reprinted with permission from Russia’s Strategic Culture Foundation.

Radical Islam attacks Central Asia
©  Aleksandr Shustov
Source:  Strategic Culture Foundation
November 26, 2010

Hizb ut-Tahrir and other similar international radical Islamic political organizations have intensified their activities in Central Asia. In Tajikistan several dozens of members of Hizb ut-Tahrir have been arrested. During such arrests police usually finds batches of books, brochures, CDs with the propaganda of radical Islam.

In August, a court in the north of Tajikistan sentenced 10 members of Hizb ut-Tahrir to prison terms from 3 to 15 years. Besides the members of Hizb ut-Tahrir the members of Salafiyyah and Tablighi Jamaat are also prosecuted and last year more than one hundred of supporters of these organizations were convicted.

On November 22, it was reported about the detention of a high ranking envoy of Hizb ut-Tahrir in Kyrgyzstan. During his arrest the police found a standard set of a Hizb ut-Tahrir member: books, journals, brochures and digital media with materials promoting the party’s ideas in Russian, Kyrgyz and Uzbek languages. It was reported that Hizb ut-Tahrir was “occupying Kyrgyzstan” and its goal was to penetrate into the government and to exclude the party from the list of the illegal organizations. Hizb ut-Tahrir is recruiting state officials, businessmen, parliamentarians into its ranks paving the road for the Islamic state.

Working with the population Hizb ut-Tahrir sticks to missionary tactics – they satisfy people’s social and daily wants, collect money to buy food and clothes, allocate interest free mini-loans. By doing all this, the party avoids the ban on its activities in Kyrgyzstan and attracts new supporters showing a fair social model to the population in the state of the future, which is a caliphate. Amid the long-term political crisis in Kyrgyzstan and living standards decline this tactics works successfully.

Different figures were published about the number of active supporters of the radical Islam in Kyrgyzstan. The 2009 report of the U.S. State Department on terrorism states that in 2006-2008 the number of Hizb ut-Tahrir members has increased threefold in Kyrgyzstan reaching 15,000.

According to S. Mikhametrakhimova from the Institute of War and Peace, the number of Hizb ut-Tahrir supporters in Kyrgyzstan reaches 20,000 people. According to the maximum estimations, this autumn the number of Hizb ut-Tahrir’s fellow travelers in Kyrgyzstan has reached 100,000 people.

According to the official data (which are most likely undersized), the national security forces of Kyrgyzstan comprise 1,700 permanent members of the party. If earlier radical Islam activists acted only in the south of the country and worked mainly with the Uzbek population, now Hizb ut-Tahrir is moving to the north promoting its ideas in Russian and Kyrgyz languages.

The intensification of Hizb ut-Tahrir reflects the general trend of Isalmization of the Kyrgyz society. The ideologies of parties Taza Dyn Kharakaty (Pure Islam movement), Akyl-Es-Ruh-Yiman (Wisdom-Spirit-Faith) are very close to Hizb ut-Tahrir’s ideology – they see Kyrgyzstan as part of the Islamic World. Taza Dyn Kharakaty is mainly financed by the Turkish religious organization IBDA-C (İslami Büyükdoğu Akıncılar Cephesi – the Great Eastern Islamic Raiders’ Front). Since the beginning of the year IBDA-C transferred about $1.5 million to Taza Dyn Kharakaty on holding propaganda campaigns, the circulation of informational materials and renting the headquarters in Bishkek.

The involvement of the young people in Kyrgyzstan into radical Islamic movements arouses a serious concern. In the situation of high unemployment rate, low living standards and lack of trust to the authorities they easily join the radical Islam organizations. This trend is typical not only for Kyrgyzstan. After a terrorist attack in Khudzhand and clashes in the Rasht valley with armed units of Islamists among whom were many people who had received religious education abroad, the authorities of Tajikistan launched a campaign on the return of Tajik students from foreign religious educational institutions. In mid November more than 500 students returned home and several days later another 136 students arrived.

However the ban for receiving religious education abroad, the wear of traditional clothes or attempts to limit the influence of mosques and madrassas are unable to bring the trend of islamization of Central Asian society in reverse. The weakness of the authorities and social economic degradation makes the strengthening of radical islamic organizations there inevitable.

[End.]

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Tajik security services kill two militants of Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan

The following article is reprinted with permission from Ferghana News Agency.

Tajik security services kill two militants of Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan
Source:  Ferghana.ru  (citing Interfax)
October 21, 2010  18:01

Tajik security services killed two members of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) in northern Tajikistan on Thursday, the National Security Committee said, Interfax reports.

Tajik experts said one of the killed militants was the first woman in the ranks of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.

The operation took place in Childukhatoron, near Isfara, 430 kilometers northeast of Dushanbe, and close to the borders with Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan.

“The Sogd District department of the National Security Committee traced two members of the terrorist Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan – Mukhtasar Miramonova and Akram Nasimjon both born in Isfara in 1985 – on October 21,” the committee said.

“The aforesaid individuals resisted the police and were killed in a clash,” the committee said.

They were carrying two Kalashnikov submachine guns with five cartridge clips, a Makarov pistol and an F-1 grenade.

Tajikistan’s Security Service blamed the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) for involvement in organizing the explosion at the headquarters of the Khujand Regional Department for Combating Organized Crime on September 3. Three police officers were killed in the blast and 28 others sustained injuries.

Dozens of IMU and Hizb ut-Tahrir activists are arrested in the region each year. The Sogd Region is the Tajik sector of the Ferghana Valley at the junction between Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, where the influence of various extremist organizations is strong.

The Tajik authorities also blames the IMU for organizing previous bombings, including the explosion in Dushanbe in January and June 2005 and near the Emergency Situations Ministry building in 2007. Ten to 15 IMU members are convicted in Tajikistan annually.

The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, set up in Afghanistan in 1996, wants all secular governments in Central Asia to be toppled in order to become Islamic states.

[End.]

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British diplomats toadying to Uzbek dictator’s daughter

The following commentary is courtesy of UzNews.net.

British diplomats toadying to Uzbek dictator’s daughter
©  UzNews
October 14, 2010

Uznews.net – British Ambassador to Uzbekistan Rupert Joy has taken part in the style.uz fashion week, organised by the Uzbek president’s daughter Gulnara Karimova, ensuring prestige and acknowledgement for the event that is taking place on the sidelines of the cotton-picking campaign which is enslaving millions of Uzbek children.

Ambassador Rupert Joy and Director of the British Council in Uzbekistan Steve McNulty have been listed among the organisers of the style.uz fashion week, held in Tashkent on 9-14 October. The event is an extravagant glamorous fancy of Gulnara Karimova.

Both British men were by Karimova’s at a press conference in Tashkent on 12 October, answering journalists’ questions about the fashion week’s importance.

The British ambassador said that Karimova’s Fund Forum was establishing and developing international cooperation between Uzbekistan and Britain and that he was impressed by the enthusiasm and curiosity of the Uzbek youth.

Self-styled clothing and jewellery designer with her Guli brand, Karimova wants to take part in fashion shows in Milan and New York, dreaming of conquering the world with her style and beauty.

In Uzbekistan, which has been run by her father Islam Karimov, she can materialise any idea regardless of its cost or expediency.

At Karimova’s whim, Tashkent hosts Prada, MaxMara, Oscar de la Renta and other shows that are associated with luxury, and that is in the country where at least a third of the population lives below the subsistence level.

It is not surprising that world-class designers show unconcealed interest in Karimova’s money rather than human rights or the fight against corruption in Uzbekistan, but the presence of the British diplomats at Karimova’s fashion week gives rise to many questions.

Juliette Williams, the founding director of the London-based Environmental Justice Foundation that has published a number of reports on the problems of forced child labour in the Uzbek cotton industry, expressed her regret over the British ambassador’s involvement in Gulnara Karimova’s project.

She said she was saddened by the fact that the British ambassador gave a wrong picture about the situation in Uzbekistan by attending the fashion show.

Williams thinks that the present British envoy is hushing up the problem of human rights in Uzbekistan and is nowhere near his predecessor Craig Murray, which was heavily involved in this sphere.

Williams also criticised Steve McNulty of the British Council for taking part in Gulnara’s event instead of promoting education and cultural exchange between the two countries, when Uzbek children are deprived of their basic right to education, as they are forced to pick cotton.

The British diplomats’ behaviour is legitimising the regime in Uzbekistan which is raking up profits from exploiting children in cotton fields, Williams thinks.

Abdujalil Boymatov, the president of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan, is shocked about the British ambassador’s sponsorship of the Uzbek presidential daughter’s fashion week.

“The human rights situation is deteriorating from day to day and criminal cases are being opening against the remaining independent journalists in Tashkent, whereas the British ambassador is feasting during the plague,” he said.

Ambassador Rupert Joy was not available for comment today, but his office said that he would answer Uznews.net‘s questions next Monday.

[End.]

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Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) claims responsibility for attack on Tajikistan army convoy

Inteltrends.
September 23, 2010

The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) has claimed responsibility for attacking a Tajikistan army convoy on September 19, according to news agency Asia Plus citing Radio Liberty’s Tajik Service.

The convoy, which consisted of 75 soldiers on patrol in the mountainous Kamarob Gorge, was ambushed by mujahideen forces resulting in 40 military deaths, reports the Hindustan Times. IMU spokesman Abdufattoh Ahmadi, reported one mujahideen death during the operation.

Ahmadi said the attack was in retaliation for government policy that “shut down a thousand of mosques in the country, arrests Muslims without any reason and prohibits women from wearing Muslim clothes,” writes Asia Plus. Unless government policy is changed the attacks by IMU will continue. Displeasure over government cooperation with American and NATO forces was also cited.

Inteltrends analysis

IMU fighters assist mujahideen in Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere in Central Asia. The scope and success of the recent operation in Tajikistan, however, may be a prelude to greater involvement by IMU in regional conflicts between governments and fundamentalist Islamist forces. Central Asia is key to implementing the envisioned Islamic Caliphate, stretching from North Africa to Indonesia via the Middle East and Caucasus, Central Asia, East Turkestan (China’s Xingiang Province), parts of Thailand, Malaysia and south Philippines. Mujahideen movements are increasingly sharing tactics and personnel in furtherance of this objective.

The IMU’s renewed aggressiveness may be attributed to its new leadership. Usman Adil was recently acknowledged as Emir although his appointment may have occurred last year. He replaces Mokhammed Tokhir “Foruk” (a.k.a. Takhir Yuldashev) who was killed by an American missile strike on August 27, 2009.

IMU is establishing itself as a major player in Central Asian conflicts.

[End.]

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Tajik police suspect Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) of masterminding blast in Khujand

The following article is reprinted with permission from Asia Plus, Dushabe, Tajikistan.

Background:  At least one police officer killed and 25 others injured in Khujand blast

Tajik police suspect IMU of masterminding blast in Khujand
©  Asia Plus
By Nargis Hamroboyeva
September 3, 2010

DUSHANBE – According to the preliminary data, today’s blast in Khujand has been committed by supporters of those suspected of having killed Homidjon Karimov, former bazaar director in Isfara district.

An official statement released by the Ministry of Interior (MoI) says the blast occurred at around 8:00 am, when two cars of the Sughd regional body empowered to combat organized crime were entering the body’s territory after the investigatory experiment. “Suddenly, a sedan Volga entered the territory at high speed and ran into one of the cars and blew up,” the statement said.

According to Tajik law enforcement authorities, the terrorist act was aimed at impeding investigation into murder of Homidjon Karimov, who was closely connected with criminal circles.

Five persons have been arrested on suspicion of having been involved in killing of Homidjon Karimov and their supporters tried to arrange a crush-out for them or to impede the investigation, the statement said, noting that persons involved in the blast probably have contacts with the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU).

We will recall that former bazaar director Homidjon Karimov was shot to death on August 30. According to unofficial sources, Homidjon Karimov, who was serving the remainder of his sentence in the open-prison settlement, visited his uncle in the Surkh Jamoat on August 30 for iftor (the evening meal when Muslims break their fast during the Islamic month of Ramadan).

When Karimov was leaving his uncle’s house, a car came up to the house and unidentified gunmen shot Karimov to death from assault rifle Kalashnikov and Makarov pistol.

Isfara law enforcement authorities say Homidboy Karimov was member of one of criminal groupings that brutally beaten a local resident in May 2006. Five confederates of Karimov were sentenced to prison terms of between 9 and 13 years that time, while Karimov himself managed to flee. He was later detained and sentenced to nine years in prison.

[End.]

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Uzbek border guards take Kyrgyz border guards hostage

The following article is reprinted with permission from news agency 24.kg, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.

Uzbek border guards took hostage a group of Kyrgyz border guards headed by Colonel on neutral territory of border zone in Batken (Kyrgyzstan)
©  24.kg
By Darya Podolskaya
September 1, 2010

The Uzbek border guards took hostage a group of the Kyrgyz border guards headed by Colonel on neutral territory of the border zone in Batken (Kyrgyzstan). Tashtemir Eshaliev, the head of Defense and Regional Security Department at the regional state administration, told 24.kg news agency.

According to him, this morning a group of border guards from Kyrgyzstan crossed the border to the neutral zone to meet with counterparts from Uzbekistan, who defend the approaches to the border in Fergana Valley. They were going to talk about the opening of a transit corridor through the Uzbek enclaves of Sokh and Shakhimardan.

“However they failed to hold any negotiations. An armed detachment from Uzbekistan took our guards to an unknown destination for allegedly illegal crossing the border line. But this is a pure provocation. Now we are waiting for the chairman of the State Border Service of Kyrgyzstan to resolve the incident,” said Tashtemir Eshaliev.

He stressed that as a whole the situation in the border area remains calm.

[End.]

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Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) elects Usman Adil as new “emir” following confirmed death of predecessor

The following article is reprinted with permission from news agency Ferghana.ru.

Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan:  New “emir” is elected in concern with the death of Takhir Yuldashev
©  Ferghana.ru
August 17, 2010

Furqon.com, considered as the official website of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), reported the death of emir (head) Takhir Yuldashev. Therefore, for the first time IMU confirmed the death of its leader, almost one year after mass media learned this from his body guard and supporter.

In this concern, Furqon.com published text and audio files as well as photos of alive and dead Yuldashev.

In his statement about the death of Mokhammed Tokhir “Foruk” (the name of Takhir Yuldashev, referred by his militants), posted at the above-mentioned website, new IMU emir Usman Adil said Takhir Yuldashev was killed by an American scout aircraft missile strike on 6th day of Ramadan, 1430 (August 27, 2009) when mujahidins completed “zuhr” midday namaz. Several teammates of Yuldashev were also killed.

“The major reason why this information was not disseminated within the year was the fact that mujahidins were fighting with the gloves off in Afghanistan and especially Pakistan against the enemies of Islam”, says the new emir. “Since anti-Islam troops totally blocked our region the battles were especially violent”.

“In concern with this grievous event and based on our Shariah Jihad norms IMU leadership decided to keep this information in secret”, the new IMU leader noted.

[End.]
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See also:  Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) claims responsibility for attack on Tajikistan army convoy, Inteltrends, September 23, 2010
An analysis by Inteltrends identifying the IMU emerging as a major force in Central Asia under the leadership of Emir Usman Adil.

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