BISHKEK -- The United States says it will help to set up an antiterrorism training center in the southern Kyrgyz city of Batken, RFE/RL's Kyrgyz Service reports.
A U.S. Embassy spokesperson told RFE/RL that the project will cost $5.5 million. In October, the U.S. government helped to start construction on the infrastructure for the Chayan (Scorpion) elite military unit in the southern town of Tokmok. That project could cost a total of $9 million when finished.
In August 2009, Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiev and his Russian counterpart, Dmitry Medvedev, agreed to establish a Russian military base in southern Kyrgyzstan. There has been little done on the project since that agreement, however.