Khabarovsk Demands Now Echoing Beyond Russia’s Borders

Paul Goble

            Staunton, August 5 – A major reason the Khabarovsk protesters have captured so much attention and support across Russia is that their demand for the right to have one of their own as the head of the region is shared by many in Russia’s regions and republics and even has the support of democracy activists in general (tatar-toz.blogspot.com/2020/08/blog-post_70.html).

            But now there is evidence that support for that demand exists beyond the borders of the Russian Federation, something that could make the Khabarovsk events even more fateful either by unsettling political arrangements in other former Soviet republics or giving the Kremlin another reason for cracking down harder than it has so far.

            On July 31, the coronavirus claimed the life of Musa Yerniyazov, the head of the Karakalpak Republic legislature. Born in Karakalpakstan, he spent most of his career outside the republic but had been speaker of the regional parliament since 2002 (uzinform.com/ru/news/20200801/50604.html).

            Many Karakalpaks worry that Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev will replace him with someone lacking any ties to the region and therefore ensuring Tashkent greater control of a region that has again become a political football among Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and the Russian Federation (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2020/04/will-new-oil-fields-in-aral-sea-basin.html).

            A memorial service for Yerniyazov was held on August 1. Two days later, according to an email from Aman Sagidullayev, leader of the Karakalpak government in exile, a group of Karakalpaks went into the main square of the capital Nukus carrying the republic’s flag and signs declaring that “Citizens of Karakalpakistan Must Choose the Head of the Republic.” 

            Uzbek police quickly arrested them, but their demonstrations show that people in that impoverished republic just south of the Aral Sea are animated and likely encouraged by the same concerns that are driving the protests in Khabarovsk, an indication that in the age of the Internet such events can quickly and easily jump national borders.

Given Tashkent’s tight control of the media, no additional reports of these events have surfaced yet; but Sagidullayev’s report is entirely consistent with past developments there. And his emails to those who follow events in his republic have typically been eventually confirmed by other sources.

For background on the Karakalpak issue, which seldom gets much attention unless it becomes involved with other issues, see

windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2019/10/crimean-anschluss-infectious-some.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2019/10/karakalpak-activists-charge-tashkent.html,  windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2017/11/karakalpaks-appeal-to-putin-to-back.html,  windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2015/06/karakalpak-separatists-in-uzbekistan.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2014/11/window-on-eurasia-moscow-again-focusing.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2014/06/window-on-eurasia-tashkent-cracks-down.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2014/05/window-on-eurasia-some-karakalpaks-now.html, and  windowoneurasia.blogspot.com/2010/12/window-on-eurasia-karakalpak-separatism.html.)