The Denver Post

Kyrgyzstan capital "gone mad"
Demonstrators also rally in Belarus
By Bagila Bukharbayeva
The Associated Press

Saturday, March 26, 2005 -

Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan - Kyrgyzstan's interim leader chose key officials for a new government Friday and moved quickly to try to quell widespread disorder and looting following the ouster of longtime President Askar Akayev.

Hundreds of youths wandered the rain-slickened streets of Bishkek in mobs, wielding sticks and throwing stones at cars.

Helmeted police in bulletproof vests chased them and fired shots into the air.

Akayev's whereabouts remained a mystery, although a statement purportedly from him said he was out of the country temporarily, denied he had resigned and denounced what he called the opposition's "unconstitutional coup d'etat."

Opposition leader Kurmanbek Bakiyev emerged from the Parliament building and said he had been named acting prime minister and president.

"Freedom has finally come to us," Bakiyev told a crowd in Bishkek.

Celebrations also were reported in southern Kyrgyzstan, where the popular uprising began earlier this month in the impoverished central Asian nation.

But looting continued in the darkened capital Friday night, with shots fired near the central department store on the main avenue, witnesses said.

"The city looks as if it has gone mad," said Felix Kulov, a prominent opposition figure who was released from prison during Thursday's uprising and appointed coordinator of law enforcement.

Bakiyev's appointment as acting president was endorsed by a newly restored parliament of lawmakers who held seats before this year's disputed elections, which fueled protests against Akayev.

Bakiyev chose mostly prominent opposition figures for the posts of foreign, defense and finance ministers and chief prosecutor. For the job of interior minister, he picked Myktybek Abdyldayev, a former chief prosecutor who had been fired Wednesday by Akayev.

Meanwhile, in the Baltic state of Belarus, demonstrators tried to rally outside the office of authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko on Friday to demand his ouster in a self-declared attempt to emulate the Kyrgyzstan uprising, but they were beaten back by riot police swinging truncheons.

The Belarusian Foreign Ministry, meanwhile, harshly assailed the Kyrgyz opposition,warning that the protests that drove Akayev from power last week could destabilize the entire region.

Lukashenko, who has largely retained the Soviet system and hasn't changed the name of the KGB in his country of 10 million, has stifled dissent, persecuted independent media and opposition parties, and prolonged his power through elections that international organizations say were marred by fraud.