Noteworthy, the explosions have coincided with the ongoing trial over the accused of terrorist acts in Tashkent and Bukhara last four months ago. The explosions on March 28 and April 1 resulted in the death of 47 people, including 33 performers (15 suicides), ten policemen and four passers-by. Among those involved in this outrage are different groups, such as the terrorist Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, a certain Zhamoat aiming allegedly at the overthrow of President Islam Karimov and Hizb-ut-Tahrir (Islamic Liberation Party). The latter denies its complicity in the act of terrorism.
All the defendants have already pleaded guilty and some of them have come up with sensational testimony, They claim that the blasts in Tashkent and Bukhara were masterminded by the Taliban movement's spiritual leader Mullah Omar and that they were trained at special bases in the south of Kazakhstan, the statement having been also made by the state prosecutor at the trial. Official Astana could not put up with such a "groundless" allegation and immediately disproved the availability of any training camps on the territory of Kazakhstan. This has to be proved yet but the coincidence adds up to the defendants' guilt, said Alexei Malashenko, a member of the Moscow Carnegie Center's research council. Last March, he said, many experts presumed that the acts of terrorism in Uzbekistan were either in-fighting by the mob, or provocation on the part of the authorities who decided to punish the terrorists. He excludes this possibility this time but notes that these acts of terrorism may play into the hands of Islam Karimov and at the same time be a warning to him by international terrorism.
The matter is that relations between Tashkent and Washington have recently aggravated. The situation today is different from 2003 when the U.S. admitted certain progress in the human rights situation in Uzbekistan. Mr. Karimov wants to improve relationships with Washington and therefore even considers the prospect of shipping troops to Iraq, according to Mr. Malashenko. This idea could be further developed in light of recent discussions about the shipment of a Moslem military contingent to Iraq. Alexei Malashenko does not rule out therefore the possibility of the terrorists' warning Islam Karimov. It must be not by chance that the explosions were set at the American and Israeli embassies while the Russian embassy which is located not far from the Israeli one remained unaffected.
Mr. Malashenko does not think the outrage in Tashkent can have any direct impact on Russia. He adds however that international terrorism has no frontiers today and the world community should unite to deal away with this challenge. Russia sees its task in the cohesion of the ranks of the anti-terrorist coalition. Konstantin Kosachev, chairman of the State Duma committee on international affairs, said that Russia should offer emergency aid to Uzbekistan.
