The State-Crime Nexus in Central Asia: State Weakness, Organized Crime, and Corruption in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan Erica Marat SILK ROAD PAPER October 2006 The State-Crime Nexus in Central Asia: State Weakness, Organized Crime, and Corruption in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan Erica Marat © Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Program – A Joint Transatlantic Research and Policy Center Johns Hopkins University-SAIS, 1619 Massachusetts Ave. NW, Washington, D.C. 20036 Uppsala University, Box 514, 75120 Uppsala, Sweden www.silkroadstudies.org “The State-Crime Nexus in Central Asia” is a Silk Road Paper produced by the Central Asia- Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Program. The Silk Road Papers series is the Occasional Papers series of the Joint Center, published jointly on topical and timely subjects. It is edited by Svante E. Cornell, Research and Publications Director of the Joint Center. The Central Asia-Caucasus Institute and Silk Road Studies Program is a joint transatlantic independent and externally funded research and policy center. The Joint Center has offices in Washington and Uppsala, and is affiliated with the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies of Johns Hopkins University and the Department of Eurasian Studies of Uppsala University. The Joint Center is the first of its kind and is today firmly established as a leading focus of research and policy worldwide, serving a large and diverse community of analysts, scholars, policy-watchers, business leaders and journalists. The Joint Center aims to be at the forefront of research on issues of conflict, security and development in the region; and to function as a focal point for academic, policy, and public discussion of the region through its applied research, its publications, teaching, research cooperation, public lectures and seminars. © Central Asia-Caucasus Institute and Silk Road Studies Program, 2006 ISBN: 91-85473-23-5 Printed in Sweden Distributed in North America by: The Central Asia-Caucasus Institute Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies 1619 Massachusetts Ave. NW, Washington, D.C. 20036 Tel. +1-202-663-7723; Fax. +1-202-663-7785 E-mail: [email protected] Distributed in Europe by: The Silk Road Studies Program Uppsala University Box 514, SE-75120 Uppsala Sweden Tel. +46-18-471-2217; Fax. +46-18-106397 E-mail: [email protected] Editorial correspondence should be addressed to Svante E. Cornell, Research and Publications Director, at either of the addresses above. (preferably by e-mail) Table of Contents Preface.....................................................................................................................5 Summary and Recommendations ........................................................................ 6 Introduction...........................................................................................................11 Structure ..............................................................................................................12 Background.......................................................................................................... 13 Organized Crime Without the State..................................................................18 On Post-Soviet State-Building..........................................................................18 The Two Models of State-Crime Relationship ...............................................22 Center vs. Periphery.......................................................................................... 27 Licit and Illicit businesses..................................................................................33 Shuttle Traders’ Fortune....................................................................................35 Sports and Prisons ..............................................................................................37 The Importance of the Drug Economy ...........................................................40 Situation in Brief.......................................................................................................40 The Afghan-Tajik Border................................................................................. 43 The Pamir region.......................................................................................................44 Khatlon region ...........................................................................................................44 Parkhar and Shurobat region .....................................................................................44 Drugs and Corruption....................................................................................... 45 Drugs and the Continuity of Political Regimes ............................................. 50 Drugs and Street Crime.....................................................................................52 Drugs and Radical Movements ........................................................................ 56 Supply vs. Demand ............................................................................................61 Other Sectors of the Shadow Economy .......................................................... 63 Organized Crime Within the State.................................................................... 65 The Genesis of State-Crime Relations ............................................................65 Party Politics ......................................................................................................69 Election Campaigns...........................................................................................70 Organized Crime and the State’s Governability ............................................74 The Role of Civil Society..................................................................................78 Sources of Civil Society’s Empowerment ................................................................... 79 Kyrgyzstan: Unpopular State Leaders and Famous Mafia Chiefs................... 83 Political Participation as a Continuing Economic Process ............................83 The Post-March 24 Period.................................................................................88 Who is Kurmanbek Bakiyev? ...........................................................................89 The Story of Rysbek..........................................................................................93 Organized Crime and Law enforcement .........................................................99 Tajikistan: Guns, Drugs, and Politics ...............................................................103 The Civil War and Birth of Warlords........................................................... 104 Post-Civil War Power Relations.................................................................... 108 The Peculiarities of Organized Crime in the Post-War Period....................111 ‘Organic’ Corruption ........................................................................................114 The Situation Today: Rent-Seekers and ‘Dead Souls’ ..................................116 Long-Term Implications.................................................................................... 119 Presidents........................................................................................................... 119 Voting Systems................................................................................................. 121 Law Enforcement Agencies .............................................................................123 Drug Control Agencies............................................................................................. 123 External Debt ....................................................................................................124 Domestic Security Policy.................................................................................125 Regional Security ..............................................................................................126 State Deficits .....................................................................................................126 Conclusions: Two Models of the State-Crime Nexus.....................................128 Bibliography........................................................................................................ 132 Preface The Joint Center’s research on narcotics, organized crime and security in Eurasia has been developing since 2003. Within the framework of this larger project, one of the major findings has been the linkage of state weakness and the development of organized crime. This linkage, involving a variety of relations between the narcotics industry and state officials and bodies, threatens all states of the region, though its effect is disproportionate on small and weak states near Afghanistan, the world’s main producer of heroin. As such, this report by the Joint Center’s Research Fellow Dr. Erica Marat aspires to shed light on the two states perhaps most affected by this problem: Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. As Dr. Marat shows, the interaction between organized crime and the state takes different shapers depending on the political and economic realities of a country at a given time. This study will contribute significantly to a better understanding of the narcotics problem in Central Asia. Moreover, the study also makes a significant contribution to the theoretical literature on the linkage of organized crime and politics. As such, it is of interest to a