Election protests continue

Angry protests continued in the southern Kyrgyz city of Jalal-Abad on Monday, as thousands of people - supporters of opposition candidates who ran for parliament from the area - called for the resignation of Kyrgyz President Askar Akaev and a re-run to last week's parliamentary elections. Daily life has been at a standstill in the provincial capital for four days after protesters wearing rose coloured bows and scarves occupied three storeys of the region's main administration building. On windows left open, demands written on the same colour cloth calling for the country's leadership to resign fluttered in the breeze, as did demands for a free and fair run-off election on 13 March. Orozaly Karasartov, a spokesman for the provincial governor, told IRIN that almost all officials in the building had left their offices. While pink was the colour of the People's Movement of Kyrgyzstan (PMK), uniting nine opposition parties and groups in the former Soviet republic, protesters were not rallying in favour of a particular candidate who failed, but rather against vote-fixing and election irregularities, movement activists told IRIN. The protests were yet another sign of increased tension spreading in the mountainous Central Asian state over the 27 February polls. Government-backed candidates generally fared well in the polls, which outside observers, including the Organization for Security and Cooperation for Europe (OSCE), believe fell short of international standards. On Thursday, a small explosive device was thrown at the Bishkek apartment of prominent Kyrgyz opposition leader Roza Otunbaeva, the co-leader of the opposition Ata-Jurt (Fatherland) movement and a former foreign minister. Although no injuries were reported in the blast, speaking at a news conference later, Otunbaeva suggested a possible government connection. "This is an attempt by the authorities to intimidate the opposition," she told IRIN in the Kyrgyz capital, Bishkek. "Behave yourself, otherwise things could get worse. They are warning." Otunbaeva, an outspoken critic the president, had along with other prominent opposition members been barred from running in the election, with authorities claiming she was ineligible because she had not resided continuously in the country over the last five years. On Sunday, about 1,000 people in Kyrgyzstan's eastern Naryn province blocked a key road connecting the province to Bishkek, Radio Free Europe reported. The demonstrators were protesting against a decision by the local election commission to bar an opposition candidate from running in the second round of balloting. They demanded that candidate Ishenbai Kadyrbekov be allowed to run in the 13 March second round of parliamentary elections. The local election commission had barred Kadyrbekov from running, saying his campaign team broke election rules. Kadyrbekov is appealing the commission decision and a court was due to consider the appeal on Monday. Meanwhile, on the same day, it remained unclear where events in Jalal-Abad were actually leading. "I don't understand what happened to us," Abduhalil, an elderly, local Uzbek observing the protests told IRIN. "Nobody wants to give in." Others, however, sympathised with the protesters. "There is no smoke without fire," Sarybai Atabaev, a former teacher, told IRIN. Jalil Saparov, a journalist with the local Ferghana newspaper, told IRIN that the root cause of the tension was heavy interference by the authorities in the elections. "This, coupled with rampant corruption which is in every government organisation, skyrocketing unemployment and other social problems, fuels the protest's mood," he explained. Although police units from neighbouring provinces had been sent to Jalal-Abad, analysts said that the authorities would try and ease the situation without violence.