BISHKEK: Kyrgyzstan’s president won a second term by an overwhelming margin on Friday, but opponents and Western observers harshly criticized the election in the Central Asian country, a focus of US-Russian rivalry.
Washington and Moscow have military air bases in the country, which lies in the vast, conflict-prone region north of Iran and Afghanistan. Both have expressed concern about what they regard as a rise in Islamic militancy in the region.
The central election commission said President Kurmanbek Bakiyev had won 85.4 percent of Thursday’s vote, with 73 percent of ballots counted. Opposition rival Almazbek Atambayev, who has denounced the vote as rigged, had 7.5 percent.
“Sadly this election did not show the progress we were hoping for,” said Radmila Sekerinska, head of the observation mission from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. “It again fell short of key standards Kyrgyzstan has committed to as a participating state of the OSCE.”
The election watchdog said the vote was marred by ballot box stuffing, inaccuracies in voter lists and multiple voting.
Accused by opponents of exaggerating the Islamist threat to shore up his own power, Bakiyev has vowed to use all means to preserve stability and prevent unrest.
“Bakiyev lost this election. Kyrgyzstan has no legitimate president. He could have easily been given 190 percent,” Atambayev, a former prime minister, told Reuters.
The Swedish EU presidency endorsed the OSCE’s report and said the EU stood ready “to assist Kyrgyzstan in its efforts to bring the election process into line with OSCE commitments and other international standards for democratic elections.”
“The election was clearly a step in the wrong direction. It was a mess,” said a Western observer who asked not to be named.
A nation of mountain villages, clan rivalries and nomadic traditions, Kyrgyzstan was calm on Friday after a day of tension. Life in the capital Bishkek, its low skyline shimmering in the intense summer heat, also appeared to go back to normal.
The West is concerned with Bakiyev’s increasingly authoritarian stance but it also views stability in Kyrgyzstan as key to its efforts to insulate Central Asia against the spread of militant Islamism from Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The opposition said it planned more protests. Atambayev said his observers had documented widespread cases of people submitting multiple ballots, and a number of his monitors had been harassed.
