BISHKEK PREPARING FOR ANOTHER NIGHT OF RIOTS
RIA Novosti
BISHKEK, March 25 (RIA Novosti) - Bishkek residents are bracing themselves for another night of riots that swept the capital last night.
Shops, markets, petrol stations, and bureaux de change, are all closed in the city. Along with tens of looted and sometimes burnt down supermarkets associated with the Akayev family, people attacked small retail outlets and service offices.
A group of active protesters who stormed the government house yesterday came to ask parliamentarians today to introduce a curfew for the sake of security of local residents.
"Our demand is to introduce a state of emergency to install democracy. People need be "sticks" to begin with," said Talai, a physical education teacher.
The opposition supporters surrounded parliamentarians during the day asking them to bring order, but the majority of the parliamentarians passed by hiding behind their assistants and bodyguards.
A female revolutionary in a white top embracing her 11-year-old son called on the parliamentarians to introduce a state of emergency in the city.
"I am happy that we have carried out a revolution. But we are afraid now, I will not let my son go to school. Boys are already sitting outside shops waiting for the night to come to loot them. When these hooligans are through with the shops, they will go around people's flats. They are not patriots who want democracy," the woman said.
There is no single leader of the Bishkek "Maidan" [Maidan is the name of the square where the orange revolution took place in Ukraine], only commanders of small detachments formed in a village or district. Excited people easily follow provocative appeals, occasionally voiced in the crowd, and to reconciliatory addresses of parliamentarians who appear to stop another storm.
Opposition supporters from southern Kyrgyzstan, where the anti-Akayev movement is quite strong, have set up a camp on a lawn outside the government house.
Elderly families wearing national costumes drink tea sitting on a big carpet spread on the grass next to the army tents.
"Politicians are struggling for portfolios. Somebody needs the riots in the city. Mafia is always the winner," a man in a suit says.
Since the riots began in Kyrgyzstan, 15 people have died, and two are in a critical condition. RIA Novosti learnt this from a source in the National Security Service of Kyrgyzstan.