Despite the end of communism, the Central Asian republics are still controlled by family-based oligarchtes that continue to rule with an iron-fist. Dissent is ruthlessly suppressed.
Uzbekistan, which became independent when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, is yet another Muslim country under a tyrannical and exploitative dictator, and mired in civil strife and economic deprivation as a result of the corrupt and ruthless exercise of power...
President Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan is one of Central Asian’s most repressive rulers. Yet the US, which claims to be the world’s main protector of human rights, has made him its ‘best friend’ in the region since September 2001.
When the Muslim Central Asian countries became independent in 1991 after the collapse of the Soviet Union, their leaders — who had been regional heads of the KGB in most cases — promised prosperity and democracy.
President Islam Karimov, a dictator well-schooled in the old methods of Soviet repression, is intensifying his regime’s crackdown on all forms of dissent, whether Islamic or secular.
Twelve Uzbek Muslims were sentenced to jail terms ranging from five to eight years last month, after being found ‘guilty’ of belonging to illegal Islamic organizations and other charges
Malaysia’s prime minister Mahathir Mohamad and Uzbekistan’s president Islam Karimov have received public recognition for their presumed services to Islam. Neither man will be dismayed by the dubiousness of the honour or its source.
