The Wall Street Journal
November 22
fter embracing a bold military partnership with the U.S. that could reshape the balance of power in Central Asia, Uzbekistan is balking at what had seemed a modest request: that it open a bridge to help feed hundreds of thousands of hungry Afghans.
So far unmoved by appeals from Western governments, U.S. lawmakers, the United Nations and foreign aid groups, Uzbekistan has kept tightly sealed a border crossing to Afghanistan, slowing the delivery of food, medicine and other emergency supplies to the northern Afghan city of Mazar-e-Sharif, which lies fewer than 80 kilometers south of this Uzbek frontier town.
The discord over Friendship Bridge, a Soviet-era span over the Amu Darya river, flows from a mismatch of priorities beneath the surface of Washington's global coalition in the war against terrorism.
With Taliban troops now in chaotic retreat across much of Afghanistan, the West wants to head off a humanitarian disaster that would tarnish military victory and strengthen arguments that toppling Mullah Mohammed Omar and his supporters will bring scant relief to ordinary Afghans. Uzbekistan, though, worries little about public relations. Its authoritarian president, Islam Karimov, keeps a tight grip on media, a reality little-changed from the Soviet era. Mr. Karimov's overriding goal is to insulate Uzbekistan from the turmoil across the border and from his enemies who found shelter there.
On the issue of a new government in Afghanistan, the Northern Alliance, which now controls most of the country and the capital Kabul, has agreed to attend power-sharing talks in Bonn, Germany, next week, and the search is on for leaders to represent the dominant Pashtun ethnic group.
Germany said Wednesday that the talks would be held in Bonn rather than Berlin. An aide to the former Afghan king, Mohammad Zaher Shah, said his delegation would include at least one woman.
In the Uzbek capital of Tashkent on Tuesday, two senior U.S. senators, Carl Levin and John Warner, joined a chorus of voices asking for the opening of Friendship Bridge, built in 1982 to speed Soviet tanks and troops into Afghanistan during Moscow's decade-long war there. "The response was that it's going to be open as soon as the Afghan side of the bridge is secure," said Mr. Levin, chairman of the Senate's Armed Services Committee.
Aid workers and diplomats, however, express bafflement and chagrin at the Uzbek government's reluctance to allow swift entry to a region of Afghanistan that has been under control of the Northern Alliance for nearly two weeks and urgently needs food. Mazar-e-Sharif was the first Afghan city recaptured by forces opposed to the Taliban regime.
For Uzbekistan, though, the opening of Friendship Bridge involves more than just allowing a transport corridor for trucks. Officials fear signaling a broader opening in the country's closed political system.
Eager to help the U.S. destroy the Taliban regime and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, a militant group that operated out of Afghanistan, Mr. Karimov last month allowed U.S. forces to use a former Soviet air base in the south of Uzbekistan. The decision dismayed conservative Russian generals but has since brought Mr. Karimov rewards.
Washington has muted its criticism of Uzbekistan's human-rights record and is considering a big aid package. The IMU faces obliteration, with scores of its members now trapped in the besieged northern Afghan city of Kunduz.
By moving to crush the IMU, however, Mr. Karimov might also weaken a pillar of his own rule -- a fear of Islamic extremists that allowed him to silence even nonviolent opponents, mask the failures of an economy in crisis and justify a political system frozen in Soviet-style methods. Sealed since 1997 and studded with armed guards, the border with Afghanistan has become a symbol of Mr. Karimov's determination to keep both Uzbekistan and his own power secure.
Instead of opening Friendship Bridge, Uzbekistan has offered only shipment of food by barge across the Amu Darya River, which brings far less than what can be transported by road. Moreover, delivery to Afghans in need has been hampered by Uzbekistan's refusal to let foreign aid workers cross the border. The U.N. said this week that 120,000 Afghan children could die if assistance doesn't arrive before winter begins. Said Philippe Heffinck, Central Asia representative for the United Nations Children's Fund: "It's a race against time."