From Kurds in Turkey to Uighurs in Xinjiang in China, the instability factor of minorities is turning Central area into a time bomb. What happened in the southern parts of Kyrgyzstan between the dominant Kyrgyz and the minority Uzbek has not been well explained. The massacre that killed about 2,000 people and forced about one 100,000 others to flee to neighbouring Uzbekistan was the second ethnic clash in 20 years. When Kyrgyz police forces entered the city of Jalalabad, they attacked the Uzbeks. While the government accused the former president's son of plotting the clashes, locals said that rumours of raping women and of killings instigated the Kyrgyz to attack the Uzbeks. Kyrgyzstan houses a Russian and a US military base. The new government allied itself with Russia and sent a message to Washington that its military base might not last long. The attacks on Uzbeks showed that armed gangs planned and co-ordinated their actions. Russia abstained from responding to its new friends by sending troops, but it just sent some limited paratrooper forces to secure its citizens there. The US called for an international committee to investigate the causes of turmoil. However, Russia cannot risk losing its leading role in post-Soviet republics and proposed security role for the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO). The Western countries used the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, (OSCE) to discuss the crisis. The OSCE military arm, NATO, fights an uncertain war in nearby Afghanistan and beefing up troops was barely agreed months ago, responding to requests to the subsequently dismissed General Stanley McCrystal. In fact, many countries think about withdrawing their troops from central Asia and therefore sending troops to another country there is out of the question. The countries that want to maintain influence in Central Asia for both geopolitical and energy reasons are nearly all of the countries from Turkey to China as well as Russia and the US. All countries are happy that the US fights now in Afghanistan instead of them, although they may not all accept American domination in Central Asia. The conclusion was clear in Obama-Medvedev summit that both global military forces agreed to co-ordinate their aid to Kyrgyzstan. Kyrgyzstan has a border of more than 1,000 miles with Xinjiang, where the Uighur Muslim minority seeks independence. The area from the eastern border of Turkey to Xinjiang is called Turkmenistan and most of the ethnic groups are of Turkish origin and their languages are dialect forms of the Turkish language. If the Americans withdrew from Afghanistan before building a state, instability would spread from the core to the entire area. From Kurds to Uighurs, the chaos would take the form of armed groups co-ordinating against states armies, the geography there playing in favour of the former more than the latter. People in many areas would sympathise with the groups as a reaction to many years of oppression. Even political ideologies would not reflect real intentions. While the armed gangs would declare the goal of independence, their warlords' aim will be opium cultivating and smuggling. States would declare war on terrorism while seeking more influence in the area rich in oil and mineral resources. With Afghanistan reported to have mineral wealth equalling one trillion dollars, it is just a good cake for regional and global forces to have a slice of. Another thing that strategists should observe is that three countries of the Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC) group ��" Russia, India and China ��" face security troubles in their vital spheres. These difficulties may affect their ability to continue rising in the international economy.
