Restless Valley : Revolution, Murder, and Intrigue in the Heart of Central Asia

It sounds like the stuff of a fiction thriller: two revolutions, a massacre of unarmed civilians, a civil war, a drug-smuggling highway, brazen corruption schemes, contract hits, and larger-than-life characters who may be villains . . . or heroes . . . or possibly both. Yet this book is not a work of fiction. It is instead a gripping, firsthand account of Central Asia’s unfolding history from 2005 to the present. Philip Shishkin, a prize-winning journalist with extensive on-the-ground experience in the tumultuous region above Afghanistan’s northern border, focuses mainly on Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. Both nations have struggled with the enormous challenges of post-Soviet independent statehood; both became entangled in America’s Afghan campaign when U.S. military bases were established within their borders. At the same time, the region was developing into a key smuggling hub for Afghanistan’s booming heroin trade. Through the eyes of local participants—the powerful and the powerless—Shishkin reconstructs how Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan have ricocheted between extreme repression and democratic strivings, how alliances with the United States and Russia have brought mixed blessings, and how Stalin’s legacy of ethnic gerrymandering incites conflict even now. This award-winning foreign correspondent's vivid account of Central Asia's recent history “reads like a novel but is the stuff of hard-won journalism” (Gary Shteyngart, author of Absurdistan). Here are the stories of two revolutions, a massacre of unarmed civilians, a civil war, a drug-smuggling highway, brazen corruption schemes, contract hits, and larger-than-life characters who may be villains, heroes, or possibly both. Restless Valley is a gripping, contemporary chronicle of Central Asia from a veteran journalist with extensive experience in the region. Both Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan have struggled with the challenges of post-Soviet, independent statehood, and both became entangled in America's Afghan campaign when the United States built military bases within their borders. Meanwhile, the region was becoming a key smuggling hub for Afghanistan's booming heroin trade. Through the eyes of local participants—the powerful and the powerless—Shishkin reconstructs how Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan have ricocheted between extreme repression and democratic strivings; how alliances with the United States and Russia have brought mixed blessings; and how Stalin's legacy of ethnic gerrymandering continues to incite conflict today. “The weird, the strange, the corrupt, and the grand are all evident... [Shishkin] relentlessly pursues and then tells the stories of the most corrupt and powerful and also the most sincere and admirable characters who inhabit these mountains.” —Ahmed Rashid, The New York Review of Books Two revolutions, a massacre of unarmed civilians, a civil war, a drug-smuggling highway, brazen corruption schemes, contract hits, and larger-than-life characters who may be villains ... or heroes ... or possibly both. A gripping, firsthand account of Central Asia's unfolding history from 2005 to the present. Shishkin focuses mainly on Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. Both nations have struggled with the enormous challenges of post-Soviet independent statehood; both have developed into a key smuggling hub for Afghanistan's booming heroin trade Contents 8 Introduction 10 1 The Tulip Revolution 14 2 On the Heroin Highway 57 3 Anatomy of a Massacre 81 4 The Dark Years in Kyrgyzstan 105 5 The Land of Perpetual Revolution 173 6 The Financier Vanishes, and Other Riddles 211 7 Restless Valley 247 8 Our Son of a Bitch? 281 Epilogue. Family Connections 309 Notes 316 Acknowledgments 320 Index 322 A 322 B 323 C 323 D 324 E 324 F 324 G 324 H 325 I 325 J 325 K 325 L 326 M 326 N 326 O 326 P 327 Q 327 R 327 S 327 T 328 U 328 V 329 W 329 Y 329 Z 329 A reporter's vivid account of Central Asia's wild recent history-violent in the extreme and rife with characters both heroic and corrupt