Kyrgyzstan

I don't know how many people have been paying attention to this but recently it looks like a revolution is brewing in Kyrgyzstan. The mass revolt that toppled the autocratic president of Kyrgyzstan had its roots in the impoverishment of the mass of the population and growing discontent over repression and human rights violations. Predictably, many commentators in the U.S. press focused on the implications for the U.S. airbase in the town of Manas, a critical part of the supply chain for the U.S. war in Afghanistan. Some pundits have pointed the finger at Russia, which was upset over the pro-U.S. tilt of the ousted Kyrgyzstan President Kurmanbek Bakiyev. But Russian President Dimitri Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin couldn't have been pleased by the sight of demonstrators who defied the police, seized their weapons, and stormed the parliament and the presidential palace. Anxieties will be greater still in the presidential palaces of the neighboring Central Asian states of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan, where despots fear a similar mass rebellion. Thus, a popular revolt in a country of just 5 million people has sent shock waves through the region. As Russian author and activist Boris Kagarlitsky said in an interview from Moscow: "This was more of a social uprising then a revolution. There is a lot of unrest. But while people are rebelling against the current regime, they have no trust in the opposition, either. It is a social uprising with very little political perspective. Sooner or later, one or another group of elites will take over, because there is no other political force capable of doing so." Here is a video of what has been taking place over the last few days: