Domino syndrome in Central Asia

Kyrgyzstan is one of the poorest entities of the former Soviet Union, which collapsed sensationally in the early nineties. More than half a dozen states, known as Turkic states, because of linguistic and racial affinity with Turkey, emerged. In the beginning Turkey, not only because of historical, ethnic and geographical links, made a bold effort to draw those newly independent countries closer. A new department was set up with the Foreign Ministry in Ankara and Turkey entered virtually in foreign aid field. It was in the construction field that she made a great headway and Turkish entrepreneurs have made large foray inside Russia and the former Soviet Union. In Istanbul Turkey set up the Black Sea Economic Council and members around the Black Sea and near neighbours like Greece joined the organisation.

Russia, whose territory these were until 1990, could not remain indifferent to these developments. She set up a more tightly knit organisation with Moscow as the headquarters and it embraced all the former states of the Soviet Union. The truth is that the collapse of the Soviet Union came so suddenly that most of the states were quite unprepared for it. I remember that Bangladesh sent a delegation to the former Soviet Union immediately after its collapse and I as a member of that delegation visited nearly all the states. I recall that the Foreign Minister of Turkmenistan, who loved to play banjo, openly telling us that they did not need to be independent! In fact most of those far flung areas were blissfully ignorant of the events taking place in Moscow. In Moscow itself a pall of gloom had descended by the rapid unfolding of events and from the present developments it would seem that gloom has not lifted.

The United States, which had little interest in the area since it was part of the Soviet Union, has had a big change in her foreign policy since the events of Afghanistan. The US has become a Central Asian player and every time a new development takes place in any of the Republics, the name of the US automatically figures. We have seen this in the recent past in Ukraine. Indeed the importance of this big country for Russia can hardly be over estimated. Yet changes have taken place there in the recent past and the hand of the US is clearly visible. The changes in Kyrgyzstan are so strange that they border on the farcical. Here the President Askar Akayev is accused of manipulating some elections and some people take to the streets and President Akayev, who held power for more than a decade, vanishes from the scene. It would also appear that there is no taker for the White House!

The collapse of the Soviet Union was a major event of the last century as the birth of Marxism-Leninism was in the beginning of the century. Marxism was a bold experiment in carrying the message of equality throughout the world. It crashed out and has created a yawning vacuum. The lone superpower the US by the event of 9/11 has seen losing her superpower status. For the first time in her two century-old history the US was attacked from within on her own soil and fortress America crumbled.

The world has become a far more dangerous place because the bipolar balance has vanished. We are living in a chaotic world. There is nothing in sight that something is going to emerge to steady the globe. We can only keep our fingers crossed.

Arshad-uz-Zaman is a former Ambassador.