last updated December 3, 2003

The Kyrgyz population includes substantial minorities of ethnic Uzbeks and Russians, along with Uighurs, Dungans (ethnic Chinese Muslims), and Tatars. Between 1991 and 2002, more than 600,000 people emigrated from Kyrgyzstan, and the ethnic minority portion of the population declined from 47 to 33 percent.

Increased emigration is a trend affecting all minority ethnic groups in post-independence Kyrgyzstan. Minority groups cite ethnic tensions, rising nationalism, the collapse of the industrial sector, and discrimination in employment, education, and business as motivations for emigration. Ethnic tensions have been particularly high in the south, where a 1990 Kyrgyz-Uzbek dispute over land allocation broke into deadly riots and assaults on ethnic minorities. Moreover, the country’s economic woes have fallen disproportionately on minority families: in the early 1990s, ethnic minorities were among the first to lose their jobs when nearly 60% of the country’s industrial enterprises closed.

Ethnic Uzbeks, who reside primarily in southern Kyrgyzstan, are experiencing increasing mistreatment by authorities primarily due to their association with Islam. Kyrgyz efforts to combat Islamic “extremism” has led to repression of Muslims. The majority of Muslims affected are members of the non-violent Islamic Hizb ut-Tahrir organization, whose members in Kyrgyzstan are mostly ethnic Uzbeks. Dozens of non-violent Muslims been detained, physically mistreated, and jailed. At least 40 members of Hizb­ut­Tahrir were reportedly convicted and sentenced to prison in 2000 on charges of distributing leaflets and inciting national, racial or religious intolerance, and the majority of those detained were apparently ethnic Uzbeks. In 1998, at least one Uzbek national was expelled from the country for disseminating “fundamentalist” Islamic ideas.

In addition, ethnic Uzbeks face social and informal governmental restrictions on civil liberties and cultural rights. Though ethnic Uzbeks held important national posts in the early post-independence years, the system of centrally appointing, rather than electing, mayors and governors has limited ethnic Uzbek participation in local politics, even in those areas in which they constitute a majority.

Ethnic Russians are emigrating steadily from Kyrgyzstan. Those remaining have complained about discrimination, particularly in the allocation of upper-level civil service positions, where Russians as a group are underrepresented.

Uighurs, a Turkic people whose dominant religion is Islam, are experiencing ever- worsening treatment in Kyrgyzstan. This is primarily a result of two developments. First, Kyrgyzstan's participation in regional efforts against Islamic “extremism” has led to repression of Uighur Muslims and other Muslims in Kyrgyzstan. Second, Kyrgyz officials are supporting China’s sometimes-violent campaign against Uighur “ethnic separatists” and their suspected supporters and sympathizers in China’s Xinjiang province. In 1996, Kyrgyzstan joined the Chinese-led Shanghai Cooperation Organization, under which members have agreed to coordinate their security forces. According to unofficial sources, Kyrgyzstan has actively cooperated with China in tracing suspected Uighurs from Xinjiang province; Chinese State Security officers are reported to regularly visit Bishkek where they detain or assist the Kyrgyz authorities in arresting Uighurs. Uighur rights groups have expressed concern about the political and economic pressures they say China is exerting on its neighbors to repress Muslim separatism, and about the fact that Uighurs seeking political asylum in Central Asia have been handed over to the Chinese government, which has executed some asylum-seekers. In 2000, for example, Kyrgyzstan violated its international obligations by forcibly deporting an ethnic Uighur to China, where he risked mistreatment including torture. Nevertheless, in 2001, Kyrgyzstan re-affirmed its commitment to aiding China by signing another agreement of cooperation which provided for, among other things, mutual extradition of “criminals hiding on their territories.”

In recent years, a number of incidents have escalated tensions between Kyrgyz authorities and the Uighur community. In March 2000, Nigmat Bazakov, chairman of the Ittipak Uighur Society in Kyrgyzstan, was fatally shot at his home in Bishkek. Kyrgyz authorities charged four ethnic Uighurs in the crime, though the victim’s family rejected the possibility that Uighurs were involved, and human rights activists blame Chinese security services for the murder. In February 2002, a large Uighur-run market in Bishkek was destroyed by a fire which started after Uighur workers went to mosque for evening prayer. The fire followed an earlier series of unexplained smaller fires at the market, and Uighurs associated with the market complained of improper conduct by police and firefighters at the scene. Later that year, several Chinese businessmen and government officials were murdered in execution-style killings; Kyrgyz authorities blamed Uighur separatists. Also in 2002, the U.S Department of State added the Uigur separatist movement to its list of terrorist organizations, though Kyrgyzstan’s Uighur community denies ties to al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations.

The Kyrgyz government has made some efforts to improve conditions for ethnic minorities in the country. President Akayev has introduced an anti-emigration program aimed at stemming the loss of educated and skilled minorities. He also has issued a decree declaring Russian an official language, along with Kyrgyz. In recent years, a number of representatives of ethnic minorities took posts in the government and state administration.

Compiled from:

U.S. Department of State, Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, Background Notes: Kyrgyzstan, April 2003.

Freedom House, Nations in Transit 2003: Kyrgyzstan.

Human Rights Watch, World Report 2002. 

Human Rights Watch, Kyrgyzstan: Human Rights Fact Sheet, 19 September 2002.

Minorities at Risk, Minority Group Assessments: Uzbeks in Kyrgyzstan.

Amnesty International, Central Asia, 11 October 2001.

Human Rights Watch, World Report 1999: Kyrgyzstan.

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc., Central Asia: Uighurs Say States Yield To Chinese, 29 March 2001.

Human Rights Watch, World Report 2001: Kyrgyzstan.

Amnesty International, Kyrgyzstan: Appeal Cases, 25 May 2001.

Uyghur Information Agency, Uyghur Market on Fire in Kyrgyzstan, 18 February 2002, Media Reports.