Uzbek President Karimov enjoys the kind of power that Preznit No Peace, No Justice strives for daily. From a column in the NY Times, we learn of the ordeal of an Uzbeki journalist who spoke out against the despotic, ironically-named Uzbek President, Islam Karimov.
In 1999 Ruslan Sharipov, a student from Uzbekistan, came to the United States, participating in an exchange program. Upon returning home, Sharipov and two colleagues formed the Independent Journalists Association of Uzbekistan. He began reporting, through a Russian news agency and on the Internet. His chief subject was the dismal human rights record of the Uzbek government of Islam Karimov, whose zeal in persecuting Muslims and torturing political prisoners, and on occasion murdering them, is routinely deplored by human rights groups.
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Sharipov has managed to get a letter from prison, addressed to Kofi Annan and to Human Rights Watch. He explains that he was tortured into confessing; he was forced to write his own suicide note and threatened with murder; he was suffocated with a gas mask; unknown substances were sprayed down his throat. He was threatened with rape and with infection with the HIV virus. These last details gain a particular sinister significance when one considers the nature of the charges against Sharipov. He was convicted not of writing critically about his repressive government. He was convicted of engaging in homosexual acts, which is a crime in Uzbekistan under Stalin-era law, and of having sex with minors, an unsubstantiated charge Sharipov denies.
This month the U.S. Congress will decide whether to approve the Bush administration's request for more than $50 million in foreign aid to Uzbekistan. Assistant Secretary of State Elizabeth Jones testified before a House subcommittee that Sharipov's case is a clear example of Uzbekistan's dismal human rights record while at the same time making a point: Uzbekistan is an important ally in the Bush administration's Central Asian strategy. Military aid to Uzbekistan since Sept. 11, 2001, has risen 1,800 percent.
There is no truth to the rumour that Chimpy has a picture of Karimov over the bed, and uses it to get excited...you know that way when he's faced with his mahnly Hump-a-Lump duties.
It's that boiling'em alive thing that gets him the hottest.
posted by Jo Fish on 03.08.04 at 12:51 AM
Comments:
Karimov is not all that different from many of the current rulers of the former Soviet republics. Having trained in the Stalinist management academy, they lack many of the refinements usually associated with rulers since the First Crusade.
Having seen what association with Franco's Spain, Greece under the colonels, and Iran under the Shah did to the United States, I really can't imagine what the US foreign policy people are thinking.
posted by: Bryan on 03.08.04 at 06:01 PM [permalink]
