Kyrgyzstan Repeating Same Mistakes Again

I am skeptical about the ongoing violent riots in Kygyzstan. Even if the new government manages to restore order and keep power, there is slim chance that the country will become more democratic after this revolution. On the other hand, it’s likely that the new government will be just like the old one or even worse. Little has changed since five years ago when Bakyiev came to power after a similar (though not so bloody) rebellion. But even if Kyrgyzstan becomes a little better than it was (something compared to Ion Iliescu’s rule in Romania compared to Nicolae Ceausescu’s), the price is too high–both in human lives and in damage to the political system and the society.

Rocks and AK47s are bad tools for building democracy.

The Moscow Times published my comment on this story today:

Oleg Kozlovsky, an activist with the Oborona youth movement, said by letting the protests turn violent, the opposition had ceded hopes for another color revolution in a post-Soviet country.

“With such methods they will hardly achieve anything better [than the current government] if they win,” he wrote on his Twitter blog.

Speaking to The Moscow Times, he said he was disappointed to see the violence and looting. “These protests are more like spontaneous riots than an organized regime change. This is not what happened in Ukraine,” he said.

He was referring to the 2004 Orange Revolution, where mass protests against election fraud brought a new, pro-Western government to power.

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