People suspected of preparing a coup in Kyrgyzstan were detained en masse. These resource reports refer to the Kaktus.Media publication. According to the journalists’ interlocutor, “a group of people was preparing to seize power by force”, and the security forces “detain all active participants.”
Kaktus.Media source declined to name the suspects. It is also unknown which political force the detainees may be linked to.
The publication “AKIpress Summary” released a video of the arrests.
“In Bishkek, GKNB (State Committee on National Security – socialbites.ca) employees are making arrests… special services detained suspects who attempted to seize power by force,” the publication says.
Press Secretary of the President of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Peskov, said Moscow did not yet have detailed information about the failure of the coup in Kyrgyzstan, but there was “absolutely disturbing news”.
North and South
In the last 20 years, the government in Kyrgyzstan has changed three times with a coup. President Askar Akayev, who has ruled the country since 1990, was overthrown in 2005 during the Tulip Era.
Then, in Bishkek, protesters captured the Government House and a number of other administrative buildings. The opposition accused Akayev of corruption, nepotism and increasing the influence of his own clan.
Also, before the Tulip Era, the children of Kyrgyzstan’s first president – daughter Bermet and son Aidar – competed for parliament from the ruling Alga Kyrgyzstan party. However, as a result of the developments, the election results were annulled. Akev Sr. He fled to Russia and later told reporters that he did not see the need to leave Moscow, where he worked as a principal researcher at Moscow State University’s Mathematical Research Institute of Complex Systems. Only in 2023, the Prosecutor General of Kyrgyzstan stopped all criminal cases launched after the coup against the first president.
Kurmanbek Bakiyev, who became the president of Kyrgyzstan in 2005, was also overthrown by his political opponents five years later. Bakiyev was a native of the south of the country – a key division of the two largest political groups moves between the north and south. The first President Akaev was born in the north.
After Bakiyev, northerner Almazbek Atambaev became president – he held this post from 2011 to 2017. His successor was the southerner Sooronbai Jeenbekov, whose candidacy was supported by Atambaev. But Zheenbekov soon decided to get rid of his predecessor and began to persecute him and his team.
In 2019, Atambayev was detained. He was sentenced to 11 years and 2 months in prison in a corruption case in 2020. That same year, during a protest, the former president was released from prison, but was later arrested again. Jeenbekov resigned soon after due to the protests.
In 2023, the current president of Kyrgyzstan, Sadyr Japarov (a northerner), announced that he held a meeting with the participation of all the former presidents of the republic – Askar Akaev, Kurmanbek Bakiyev, Roza Otunbaeva, Almazbek Atambaev, Sooronbay Jeenbekov.
“I collected ex-presidents and put them on the same table,” the current head of state wrote on social networks. Zhaparov also said that the republic could not develop harmoniously due to the endless struggle for power, so it “was stuck in a corner of Central Asia”. He believes that such a meeting is important in terms of consolidating the country’s population.
Zhaparov noted that former presidents supported his “unification in one fist” initiative, talked about their grievances, admitted their mistakes and forgave each other.