Brief news catchup

A pretty quiet week for breaking stories, so a very quick catchup this week. It looks like Kyrgyzstani news is going to stay over at the New Eurasia Kyrgyzstan Blog for some time yet, if not permanently, which is a bit of a change of plan as this blog was originally quite Kyrgyzstan-biased. Still, can x-post and may get on to a more comment and analysis style, as Registan does. So, here we go:

Regional

• Stability and security are the name of the game in Central Asia from Iran's point of view, reports IranMania, noting that such a situation is in Iran's national security interests and citing the US as an impediment to regional integration and stability.
• Meanwhile the US is increasingly avoiding all talk of games, as Eurasianet's article on General John Abizaid's, Chief of U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), visit to Kazakhstan illustrates.
• KazInform takes a look at the economic future of Central Asia from the perspective of "bigger" Asia, noting the increasing interest in the region from east Asian countries.

Kazakhstan

• KazInform reports that the Kazakh Minister for Information, Culture and Sport, Yesetjan Kosubayev, held talks with the director of the OSCE observer mission last week, assuring the OSCE that press freedom is being observed and any infringements in press coverage in the pre-election campaigns will be fully investigated.
• Unsurprisingly, with a little under a month to go before polling day, Eurasia Daily Monitor reports that incumbent president Nursultan Nazarbaev is the clear favourite to win, citing a poll at the end of October according to which 67% of the population said they would vote for Nazarbaev.
• RIA Novosti reports that Kazakhstan is planning to sign a partnership action plan with NATO in the near future according to officials from the Kazakh Ministry of Defence.

Kyrgyzstan

• News and views over at New Eurasia Kyrgyzstan.

Turkmenistan

• NewsCentralAsia has posted a presentation by Khushgeldy Babayev, Chairman of Turkmenistan President’s State Enterprise for the Caspian Sea, on Turkmenistan's Caspian Sector - lots of technical detail and a look at what different companies are doing in the sector.
• NewsCentralAsia also notes that the Iranian Foreign Minister visited the republic last week to discuss a wide range of issues.
• Less positively, Forum 18 reports on 2 Protestants and a Hare Krishna believer being prevented from leaving Turkmenistan (horribly Kafka-esque).

Uyghur

• Radio Free Asia reports that the editor of the Kashgar Literature Journal, Korash Huseyin, has been sentenced to a three-year jail term for publishing a story, "Wild Pigeon", that was seen as inciting Uyghur separatism. The author of the tale is already seriving a ten-year prison term. The text of the story in question is also available on the site.

Uzbekistan

• Human Rights First have released a report, Karimov's War: Human Rights Defenders and Counterterrorism in Uzbekistan (pdf version) that as well as being highly critical of the Uzbek regime's oppresive approach, also calls on the international community to stop "letting Uzbekistan get away with murder".

Newsletters, reports, etc.

• RFE/RL Central Asia Report Vol. 5 No. 43 (Nov 10) is available.
• IWPR's Reporting Central Asia No. 418 and 419 are available.
• AlertNet's latest Central Asia Weekly Newswrap (Nov 11) is available.