Comments on: Did de Gucht go to Tashkent? – Updated

By: Rustam

Rustam — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 19:27:35 +0000

Agree with Dan. It is very strange, it seems that Europe and the US can not make up their minds about the dictator Karimov, more correctly, the strategy is – say one thing and do totally the other. And it is after all these tough words, reports of AI, HRW, ICG, FH and articles of Patten…
In centrasia.ru on Sunday there was an excellent, informative as well as disturbing article written by Talib Yakubov, Chairman of the Human Rights Organization of Uzbekistan, although I heard a lot of damaging information about him, I guess the courtesy of SNB, in which he talks about his disappointment with the OSCE, that as he says before, human rights activists used to meet with the Chairman of the OSCE and tell her/him about the situation in Uzbekistan, their concerns, Chairmans of OSCE were more decisive when it came to releasing human rights activists from jails in Uzbekistan. However, he continues, this time, before they were to meet with the Chairman of the OSCE Mr. de Gucht, they were specifically told by the employees of the Uzbek office not to talk about Andijon and about the clean up of human rights activists afterwards. More interestingly, Mr. de Gucht after all did not come to the meeting. i.e. he implies that this meeting was organised by the OSCE to report in Brussels that they had this meeting. AND MOST INTERESTING, he writes that out of 8 organizations invited there was only him, his organization representing human rights issues in Uzbekistan. EVEN better, he says that although he was told not to speak about Andijan events, the chairman of one of the Jewish organizations which, as he was told by that chairman himself, was undertaking research on terrorism in cooperation with OSCE started to talk about Andijan, when the members of the Mr. de Gucht’s delegation present there asked whether he thinks that the events that took place in Andijon were terrorist event that person, as Yakubov puts it, told the same official version, line. EVEN BETTER, as Yakubov puts it, he always used to write an official letter and used to read all what was written in it, so everyone would be aware what kind of letter was given to him, that he was aware of the situation, and give it to the Chairman so that the Chairman of the OSCE could give to the President when he meets it, so as to say don’t bull shit me Mr. President. So this time as well, he started to read this letter BUT he was shortly stopped by one of the OSCE delegates, saying that there is no need to do it, i.e. they did not even want to hear about, like one of those stories – I did not see this, or even better “to my best knowledge this question was not brought to my attention” – perfect.
Take a look at this story at the centrasia.ru, it is astonishing!!!

By: Nathan

Nathan — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 18:03:53 +0000

Dan, you’re reading a bit much into Laurence’s comment there.

If Laurence wants to blog about non-Central Asia stuff, that’s entirely his prerogative. Heck, sometimes all I want to write about are my cats and celebrity gossip.

By: Dan

Dan — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 17:52:07 +0000

As usual, Laurence is reserving his snearing and sniffy posturing for RFE/RL rather than focusing on the real issues here i.e. Karimov and what the OSCE said to him. Instead of sitting at home blogging about your cats and writing worthless books on Masterpiece Theater, try learning something about Central Asia.

What happened here is almost certainly that the Uzbeks held off on confirming a visit until the very last moment, too late probably for the OSCE or Belgian press releases and too late for the RFE/RL story. They then changed their mind and decided they would meet and so it happened. Not a great lapse on the part of Bruce Pannier or anyone else. Laurence, you should keep your mad paranoia about the media, NGOs and others in check. You just sound deranged.

By: Laurence

Laurence — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 15:15:22 +0000

Yes, Nathan, I hope Bruce Pannier answers your questions…

By: Nathan

Nathan — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 06:41:55 +0000

Well, I still respect them, but this is a sign that I need to be more skeptical of them, especially when they’re doing analytical pieces. I emailed Bruce, the author of their story, and I hope I get a response addressing how this happened.

By: Jack

Jack — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 05:36:15 +0000

Hi Nathan,

Well, you are right – live and learn. I also respected RFE/RL. But now not. I amazed how some news agencies destort situation both in Uzbekistan and other parts of Soviet Union.

By: Laurence

Laurence — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 17:45:01 +0000

Congratulations, Nathan! It wasn’t April Fool’s after all…

By: Nathan

Nathan — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 17:33:14 +0000

Thanks Jack. That’s one of the possible explanations I thought of. I figured RFE/RL would have been on top of things. I think they’re usually accurate, but live and learn.

By: Jack

Jack — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 12:07:40 +0000

Here is link to OSCE release.

http://www.osce.org/item/18584.html

By: Jack

Jack — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 11:27:21 +0000

Hi,

OSCE head visited Uzbekistan and video feed with de Gucht and Karimov with participation of Uzbek Foreign Minister Elyor Ghaniev and delegates of the OSCE.

The meeting took place on Saturday, 1 April and I assume that OSCE office was on weekend holidays.

Besides, the Uzbek president’s web site http://www.press-service.uz also made report on the visit.

I have also read reports of Interfax and BBC Monitoring on the visit of de Gucht.

I think RFE/RL made wrong reports and mislead readers. This is usual case for them.