Qishloq Ovozi (Archive)

As the European Union scrambles to convince Russia and Ukraine to strike a deal that ensures supplies of Russian natural gas reach EU consumers, a different set of gas negotiations have started in Central Asia.

On June 10, Russia's Gazprom, which is now the owner of Kyrgyzgaz, sent representatives to Uzbekistan to negotiate a price for gas supplies to Kyrgyzstan. As confusing as that might sound, these talks are likely to get much weirder.

First, a little background information might be helpful. In 1990, the then Soviet republic of Kirghizia used more than 2 billion cubic meters of gas. Since 2000, gas consumption has remained at about 700 million cubic meters or slightly lower. Kyrgyzstan does not have much domestic gas. Last year it produced 21.52 million cubic meters, roughly the average production figure for many years.

Most of you know that Gazprom recently completed an agreement to purchase Kyrgyzstan's state gas company Kyrgyzgaz for a symbolic $1. Russia wrote off a huge part of Kyrgyzstan's debt in return and Gazprom has pledged to invest some $570 million in repairing and modernizing Kyrgyzstan's aging gas infrastructure, pipelines and all. Most importantly, Kyrgyzstan's chronic problems with gas imports from neighboring Uzbekistan, which supplies Kyrgyzstan with some 98% of its gas, are supposed to soon be no more than a memory.

Despite some recent financial setbacks, Gazprom remains a formidable company, which some believe functions as a wing of the Russian Foreign Ministry. Gazprom should have some leverage at the bargaining table with Uzbekistan that officials from Kyrgyzgaz would previously never have had.

The Russian company's potentially greater clout includes an agreement to develop two gas fields in Uzbekistan and this is where the first possible problem emerges.

When the Russian State Duma ratified the deal for Gazprom to take over Kyrgyzgaz on January 17 this year, deputy Energy Minister Anatoly Yanovsky told lawmakers, "It's planned that gas will come from the territory of Uzbekistan [to Kyrgyzstan], but from those areas, which are currently being developed on the territory of this country [Uzbekistan] by Gazprom."

'Two's company...'

So, Gazprom's operation in Uzbekistan is going to sell Uzbek gas to a Gazprom subsidiary in Kyrgyzstan. And Yanovsky said the price would be cheaper than the price Uzbekistan was charging Kyrgyzstan. Supplies are suspended at the moment but when gas was coming it cost $290 per 1,000 cubic meters.

For Uzbekistan this all seems like a bad deal. Its gas is about to be sold to its former customer for a lower price.

But, the fields Gazprom is working in Uzbekistan – the Shakhpakhty and the Ustyurt Plateau structure – are in the far western part of Uzbekistan near the Aral Sea.

The fields are part of Central Asian gas supplies feeding, or intended to feed, the Soviet-era Central Asia-Tsentr pipeline that runs northwest to Russia.

Thus Gazprom might own some Uzbek gas, but it cannot get the gas to its destination in Kyrgyzstan without help from Uztransgaz, the subsidiary of Uzbekneftegaz, in charge of transporting gas and liquid hydrocarbons produced in Uzbekistan to domestic consumers and for export.

Trying to ship the gas across southern Kazakhstan is not an option since there is no existing pipeline network for such exports and, in any case, the gas would arrive in northern Kyrgyzstan, not southern Kyrgyzstan where it is more desperately needed. Construction of a new pipeline across the mountains that divide northern and southern Kyrgyzstan would be costly and take years.

So, negotiations have started and it remains unclear who between Gazprom and Uzbekistan has the advantage at the bargaining table.

For the people of Kyrgyzstan, particularly the people of southern Kyrgyzstan, who have grown accustomed to regular power and heating shortages, having Gazprom on their side in talks with Uzbekistan might inspire confidence that times are changing.

But, with the addition of Gazprom to the negotiations, only a complicated formula will make possible the dream of uninterrupted and cheaper supplies of Uzbek gas to Kyrgyzstan.

And I can't help thinking about that saying: "Two's company, three's a crowd."


-- Bruce Pannier, with contributions from the director of RFE/RL's Kyrgyz Service, Venera Djumataeva, and RFE/RL's Uzbek Service director Alisher Sidikov


ANNOUNCEMENT: Congratulations to my colleague at RFE/RL's Tajik Service, Saidkosim Djalolov, who has authored two new books just published – " Гар тахаммул пеша дори, одами" ("A Tolerant Man and Truths"), about religion and tolerance and " Нардбон" ("Ladder") a collection of humorous short stories.

In keeping with my promise to make Qishloq Ovozi a forum to introduce younger scholars in the field to a wider audience, this article is by Matt Kupfer, a witness to the June 2010 violence in Osh, who offers a glimmer of hope for southern Kyrgyzstan four years after the tragic events there.

On the morning of June 10, 2010, the city of Osh bustled with the sounds of daily life in southern Kyrgyzstan: microbuses zipping through the streets, pedestrians strolling through the shaded downtown, and people bartering for goods in Kyrgyz, Uzbek, and Russian in the multiethnic city’s famous open-air market. To me, an American working at a local NGO, it was an ordinary day by any measure, and one would hardly have guessed that barely two months earlier a revolution had ousted Kyrgyzstan’s kleptocratic president, Kurmanbek Bakiev.

But, that night, life in Osh was shattered, seemingly for good. Fighting erupted between a crowd of ethnic Kyrgyz and minority Uzbeks, and quickly mushroomed into full-scale interethnic rioting throughout the city and neighboring regions. Four days later, plumes of smoke billowed over Osh, large sections of the city lay in ruins, and 470 people were dead. Another 400,000 were displaced, with many seeking refuge in Uzbekistan. Although both ethnic communities suffered greatly, the majority of the victims were Uzbeks.

In the conflict’s aftermath, there seemed little room for hope. Each ethnic group now spoke of itself exclusively as the victim. Uzbeks claimed the Kyrgyz were uncivilized and incapable of living in a democratic society. The Kyrgyz accused Uzbeks of attempting to secede from Kyrgyzstan or, worse, colluding with Islamic militant organizations.

In a climate of surging Kyrgyz ethnic nationalism, Uzbek businesses were illegally seized by Kyrgyz, and Kyrgyz families took possession of houses abandoned by Uzbeks. Most worryingly, the security forces -- later implicated by an international investigation in the transfer of weapons to Kyrgyz rioters and several attacks on Uzbek neighborhoods -- were now carrying out violent sweep operations in Uzbek settlements.

But now, as Kyrgyzstan marks the fourth anniversary of what locals termed “the war,” there may be a glimmer of hope.

The wounds of 2010 have begun to heal. Residents have increasingly grown weary of the tension created by the violence, and Uzbeks have gradually reentered city life. Most surprisingly, the government has finally managed to begin addressing political problems that seemed utterly unsolvable in 2010.

One of the clearest problems was the failure of security forces during the unrest. As scholar Erica Marat has argued, former President Bakiev distorted the military hierarchy and encouraged the police to be loyal to specific officials. Bakiev’s ouster destabilized this corrupt system, leaving security forces torn between the commands of the provisional government and pro-Bakiev local leaders. The result was a breakdown of order, with security forces giving into ethnic prejudices and becoming entangled in the conflict.

Today, however, Bishkek has largely reestablished control over the army and police. The administration of President Almazbek Atambaev has also subtly fought back against Kyrgyz ethnic nationalism, something that seemed impossible four years ago. Atambaev and a group of moderate officials have sought to co-opt certain elements of Kyrgyz nationalism while simultaneously advancing more inclusive civic ideals.

These efforts came to fruition in the “Concept on Strengthening National Unity and Interethnic Relations in the Kyrgyz Republic,” published in 2013. Incorporating the views of all parliamentary factions, ethno-nationalists, and civil society, the “Concept” aims to create equality under the law for members of all ethnic groups, promote a balanced language policy supportive of multilingualism, and form a civic identity among all citizens. Some of the ideas espoused are overly ambitious (the “Concept” calls for the creation of a trilingual generation of Kyrgyzstanis), but they do represent state efforts to build a more tolerant and, ultimately, safer country. And the drive for multilingualism is not mere talk -- in 2013, Atambaev refused to sign a bill requiring the entire state administration to exclusively use the Kyrgyz language.

These were not the only positive developments. In December 2013, the government fired Osh’s wildly nationalistic mayor, Melisbek Myrzakmatov, for participating in an antigovernment protest. The only Bakiev-era top official who managed to keep his post after the 2010 revolution, Myrzakmatov had repeatedly defied Bishkek and become a major obstacle to reconciliation. A month after his firing, Myrzakmatov ran for mayor again but was defeated by Aitmamat Kadyrbaev, a politician with similar nationalist views but greater loyalty to the government.

Finally, in April 2014, a Bishkek court reopened the investigation into charges that ethnic Uzbek human rights defender Azimjan Askarov had been tortured while in prison. Despite overwhelming evidence of his innocence, Askarov was sentenced to life in prison for the murder of a Kyrgyz police officer and other crimes allegedly committed during the 2010 unrest. The reopening of this investigation could be the first step in freeing Askarov.

These political developments were hardly imaginable in 2010, yet today they are a reality. But without further efforts on the part of the Kyrgyz government, these gains may very well be lost.

True reconciliation cannot happen on its own. The modern history of southern Kyrgyzstan proves this. In 1990, a similar conflict between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks over the distribution of land took hundreds of lives. The reemergence of interethnic violence only 20 years later suggests that historical memory of the conflict and the suffering it caused will not be enough to prevent future violence.

In the past four years, there have been many important reconciliation projects carried out by international organizations and local NGOs. Such efforts must continue. Meanwhile, the government must move to implement its “Concept” and build a more tolerant society. Efforts to educate the youngest generation about tolerance and human rights would be especially helpful in ensuring that this conflict does not repeat itself in 2030. Additionally, the freeing of Azimjan Askarov, as well as other individuals who were wrongfully imprisoned, would not only right serious wrongs, but also signal a desire to move beyond the past. Finally, security sector reform to inculcate greater professionalism in the police and military would serve as a serious, albeit very difficult step to ensure that the state could extinguish the sparks of future interethnic conflicts.

True justice in Osh -- finding those actually responsible for the crimes committed during the unrest and bringing them to trial -- is politically impossible. For this reason, justice must be future-oriented. Unfortunately, despite a glimmer of hope for interethnic reconciliation, many in Kyrgyzstan still remain ethnically polarized and unconvinced. As one Uzbek friend, an educated and otherwise tolerant man, told me, “Sadly, we are all ethnic nationalists now.”

Matthew Kupfer is a writer focusing on Central Asia, Russia, and the former-Soviet Union. His work has been published in EurasiaNet.org, Registan.net, and Eurasia Outlook. Currently, he is a Junior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. In the fall, he will be pursuing an M.A. in Russia, East Europe, and Central Asia regional studies at Harvard University. In 2010, he was a witness to the interethnic violence in Osh, Kyrgyzstan and has carried out extensive research on the conflict.

You can follow him on Twitter or @Matthew_Kupfer