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Still in Control Pervez Musharraf was calm, confident and—despite a flurry of rumors—not about to announce his resignation. Instead, the Pakistani president's "concession" to his troubled nation was an announcement that he would allow Britain's Scotland Yard to help local law enforcement agencies with their investigation into last week's assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto. Speaking in a nationally televised address two hours after Pakistan's election commission announced the postponement of the ballot to Feb. 18, six weeks later than had been scheduled, Musharraf was notably deferential in his remarks about Bhutto, often invoking her "martyrdom" and extolling...

2/27/2007 - MANAS AIR BASE, Kyrgyzstan (AFNEWS) -- Airmen of the 376th Expeditionary Security Forces Squadron here are training a new breed of fighters for the war on terrorism. The Airmen normal protect the members of the 376th Air Expeditionary Wing supporting Operation Enduring Freedom, but are now helping train a Kyrgyz military working dog unit. A warehouse here has been designated as the playground, and when the building door opens, Tech. Sgt. Mark Lotre of the 376th ESFS K-9 unit gives the order to a waiting Kyrgyz team to begin searching the area. A Kyrgyz dog handler issues the...

BISHKEK, September 8 (RIA Novosti) - Polish authorities released a Kyrgyz opposition leader detained earlier on alleged drug-trafficking charges, a member of the Kyrgyz parliament said. Omurbek Tekebayev was arrested Wednesday after arriving in Poland from Turkey as part of a Kyrgyz parliamentary delegation. Tekebayev, who was traveling on a diplomatic passport, is alleged to have been carrying a Russian wooden matryoshka doll containing heroin in his baggage. "Polish authorities apologized to him [Tekebayev], saying they were convinced the MP became the victim of political machinations as an opposition leader in Kyrgyzstan," Melis Eshimkanov said. Supporters of Tekebayev claimed Thursday...

BISHKEK, September 6 (RIA Novosti) - A female American soldier from a U.S. military air base in Kyrgyzstan went missing Tuesday in the capital, Bishkek, a spokesman for the base said Wednesday. The woman was last seen on Tuesday in a city mall after she left a group of fellow servicemen from the Manas Air Base while they were shopping. Local police said they had no information about a lost American soldier. "No one has yet notified law enforcement bodies about a lost U.S. citizen," said Sherkozi Mirzakarimov, the Central Asian's first deputy interior minister. The U.S. has been renting...

BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan - A U.S. Air Force officer went missing while shopping in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek, the U.S. air base in this Central Asian nation said Tuesday. Maj. Jill Metzger separated from a group of other service members while visiting the central department store in Bishkek on Monday afternoon and has not been seen since, the Manas air base press service said. It said a group of 22 U.S. military investigators and logistics officers were searching for Metzger, along with the U.S. Embassy and Kyrgyz security and law enforcement services. The U.S. military has maintained the air base...

Ancient gold coins found in Kyrgyz mountain lake 16:34 | 30/ 08/ 2006 BISHKEK, August 30 (RIA Novosti) - Possibly the world's most ancient gold coin has been discovered in a high mountain lake in Kyrgyzstan, the chief of an archeological expedition said Wednesday. Academic Vladimir Ploskikh said an expedition from the Kyrgyz-Russian Slavic University found a 70-gram octagonal gold artifact on the northern side of Lake Issuk-Kul. "This is probably the earliest form of metal money found in Central Asia, and may have served as an archetype for later gold coins," he said. "If this [hypothesis] is confirmed, the...

Ferghana Valley: A rooster speaking \  Ferghana.Ru news agency, Firdavsy, a Ferghana.Ru correspondent, 15.03.2006 Have you ever heard roosters? Sure you have. Who hasn't? A certain rooster in the Kyrgyz town of Osh, however, is something else. Its crow has already saved it from death. Owner Ibragim Ismatullayev, his neighbors from Tadjikskaya Street in the center of Osh, and local journalists maintain that the rooster is calling Allah. This correspondent made a trip to Osh to see the wondrous rooster with his own eyes. Recalling numerous con-artists encountered in my career, I was fairly skeptical suspecting bluff or a money-extorting...

BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan — The United States won new assurances Tuesday that an important air base used to support the war in Afghanistan will remain open as long as necessary. Rice and Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev (search) signed a brief statement promising open-ended U.S. use of the Manas air base for Afghan operations.....

The Iranian Foreign Ministry reacted cautiously when asked about the recent ouster of Kyrgyz President Askar Akaev, who fled from Bishkek following the storming of government offices by protesters. Spokesman Hamid Reza Assefi said Iran is monitoring developments and added, "We hope conditions in Kyrgyzstan will return to normal as soon as possible," IRNA reported on 26 March. Tehran has worked hard in recent years to strengthen its relationship with the Akaev government, but the Iranian government cannot be expected to openly protest the democratic aspirations of the Kyrgyz people. Nevertheless, some Iranian officials have attributed the events in the...

US scatters bases to control Eurasia By Ramtanu Maitra The United States is beefing up its military presence in Afghanistan, at the same time encircling Iran. Washington will set up nine new bases in Afghanistan in the provinces of Helmand, Herat, Nimrouz, Balkh, Khost and Paktia. Reports also make it clear that the decision to set up new US military bases was made during Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's visit to Kabul last December. Subsequently, Afghan President Hamid Karzai accepted the Pentagon diktat. Not that Karzai had a choice: US intelligence is of the view that he will not be...

The people of Kyrgyzstan have spoken -- and acted. As they storm presidential palace and government buildings in the capital Bishkek, the government is paralyzed and impotent. The resignation of President Askar Akaev is the best way out of the crisis. Otherwise, the country will be facing a civil war, a bloody uprising, a possible disintegration, or all of the above. What's more, turmoil in Kyrgyzstan may destabilize its large neighbors, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, with catastrophic consequences of inter-ethnic and political violence. To prevent bloodshed, the US and its allies must act quickly to convince President Akaev to step down...

BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan - President Askar Akayev and his family left Kyrgyzstan's capital by helicopter Thursday evening, the Interfax news agency reported, hours after protesters seized government headquarters in Bishkek and claimed control of state broadcasting facilities. The report, which cited unspecified sources and could not immediately be confirmed, said the helicopter was headed toward Kazakhstan. During the takeover, about 1,000 protesters cleared riot police from their positions outside the fence protecting the building, and about half entered through the front. Others smashed windows with stones, tossed papers and tore portraits of Akayev in half and stomped on them.

Like a giant political tsunami swamping defunct old dictatorships in its path, the after-effects of Ukraine's "Orange Revolution" are sweeping across Central Asia. But it remains an open question, to say the least, whether stable, successful democracies will emerge from the upheavals. Only two months after Viktor Yushchenko was triumphantly elected by a 52 percent to 44 percent vote in the re-run second round of the Ukrainian presidential election in January, the shock waves of democracy are cracking open Kyrgyzstan, one of the five, remote, land-locked former Soviet republics in Central Asia. Opposition forces were reported in control of the...

A Kyrgyz-Russian expedition has embarked for an ancient city covered by Lake Issyk-Kul in Kyrgyzstan, local media reported Wednesday. Issyk-Kul, 2,250 square miles in area, is a mountain lake in the north of the country. Historians and legends tell about a disappeared island in the lake with fortifications near the north coast where Tamerlane, the Tartar conqueror in southern and western Asia and ruler of Samarkand, held noble prisoners in the 14th century, the Vecherniy Bishkek newspaper said. People have reported seeing stone buildings in on the bottom of northeast Issyk-Kul, not far from the mouth of the Tyup River....

Archaeologists to seek Kyrgyz Atlantis Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, Jul. 21 (UPI) -- A Kyrgyz-Russian expedition has embarked for an ancient city covered by Lake Issyk-Kul in Kyrgyzstan, local media reported Wednesday. Issyk-Kul, 2,250 square miles in area, is a mountain lake in the north of the country. Historians and legends tell about a disappeared island in the lake with fortifications near the north coast where Tamerlane, the Tartar conqueror in southern and western Asia and ruler of Samarkand, held noble prisoners in the 14th century, the Vecherniy Bishkek newspaper said.