Rumblings of Discontent Hit Uzbekistan’s Jizzakh Province

The tremors of Kyrgyzstan's revolution are being felt in neighboring Uzbekistan. According to a prominent human rights activist in Tashkent, a people's power movement is coalescing in Jizzakh Province. To counter the rise of popular opposition, representatives of President Islam Karimov administration are reportedly employing vigilante squads.

Jizzakh Province, located about 100 miles southwest of Tashkent, has proven a hotbed of unrest in 2005, with anti-government actions rooted in agrarian discontent. The already simmering conflict between farmers and the local governor, Ubaidullah Yamankulov, has evidently been exacerbated by developments in nearby Kyrgyzstan, where popular frustration over persistent poverty and pervasive corruption exploded on March 24, resulting in President Askar Akayev's ouster. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

On April 1, about 500 farmers gathered to demand that officials stop persecuting Egamnazar Shaimanov, a local human rights activist and regional representative of the Ozod Dekhkonlar, an unregistered agrarian political movement. According to Talib Yakubov -- the head of the Uzbek Society for Human Rights who is also affiliated with Ozod Dekhkonlar -- the protesters set fire to two police cars and ransacked a police station in the province's Dustlik District. Yakubov, speaking at an April 1 news conference, suggested that the Kyrgyz revolution helped spur the farmers to action. "We finally got people to believe in their power," Yakubov said. "If the people revolt against government oppression, no one can stop them."

Karimov heads one of the most repressive regimes in Central Asia, jailing thousands of Uzbeks for engaging in non-state-sanctioned forms of political and religious expression. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. Officials in Tashkent defend their actions, saying tough measures are needed to counter Islamic militant efforts to destabilize the country. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. In addition to trying to keep a tight lid on all forms of political dissent, Karimov's administration has steadfastly resisted economic reforms. The result has been a potentially volatile build-up of popular frustration.

The trouble in Jizzakh Province appears to have little connection to Islamic radicalism. The April 1 incident traces its origin to a protest in February, when farmers gathered to criticize regional government action to confiscate small-scale, private agricultural plots. That protest was forcibly broken up by groups of government toughs. Human rights activists compared the goon squads to the Black Hundreds, Tsarist-era nationalist vigilantes who carried out pogroms.

The Kyrgyz revolution apparently spurred Uzbek officials in Jizzakh to engage in preventative action to repress the farmer's movement. On March 29, five days after Akayev's downfall in Bishkek, a vigilante squad reportedly seized Shaimanov in his home, and, against his will, took him to a secluded area on the outskirts of Jizzakh City. There, five goons proceeded to beat him seriously. Shaimanov just days earlier had started a petition drive, gathering 32 signatures demanding the resignation of Yamankulov, the regional governor, the Ferghana.ru website reported.

Shaimanov was initially refused medical treatment in Jizzakh, but managed to make his way to Tashkent, where Ozod Dekhkonlar activists helped him obtain treatment in the capital. On March 31, however, Shaimanov was hastily "discharged" by doctors at the Tashkent Medical Institute and taken away by unidentified individuals to and unknown location, Ferghana.ru reported. The suspected political abduction took place just a short time after doctors told human rights activists that Shaimanov's condition prevented him from moving and was too serious to permit visitors in his hospital room, Ferghana.ru said. News of the disappearance sparked the rioting in the Dustlik District.