Russia undecided on troops to Kyrgyzstan
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Russia has received requests from the Kyrgyz interim government asking for the dispatch of troops to protect some "strategic facilities," but has yet to decide whether to do so, news agencies reported on Friday, citing a source with the defense ministry.
"We confirm that the Kyrgyz authorities asked (us) to send Russian military forces to protect the strategic objects. We took this request into account but the final decision has not been made yet," said the source.
He also noted that Russia will follow the development in Kyrgyzstan, where violent clashes between Kyrgyz and Uzbek ethnic groups broke out in the southern part of the country earlier this month.
However, in an interview with Russian daily Kommersant published on Friday, Kyrgyz interim leader Roza Otunbayeva said there was no need to deploy peacekeepers from post-Soviet security bloc in the turbulent southern part of the Central Asian state.
"There is no need to deploy any forces to the republic. The situation had stabilized. We are coping," said Otunbayeva, who visited the southern city of Osh on Friday.
The interim leader said fatalities from the clashes could be 10 times higher than the official figure of over 190 people. She meanwhile insisted the duly holding of the referendum on a new constitution slated for June 27.
On Thursday, new regulations were introduced, under which the referendum could be canceled if the country remains in the state of emergency.
In a separate development, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his Kazakh counterpart Kanat Saudabayev said international organizations must respect Kyrgyz opinion in providing assistance for stabilization.
"The ministers discussed certain aspects of international assistance to stabilization in Kyrgyzstan," said a statement from the Russian Foreign Ministry.
They "welcomed the decisions" made at the Monday meeting between security secretaries of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO).
But "other international organizations, including the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), must be guided with universal principles, show respect for the position of Kyrgyzstan and respond to Bishkek requests by consensus," the ministry said.
Kazakhstan currently holds the rotating presidency of the OSCE.
The current clashes in southern Kyrgyzstan followed violence in May when supporters of former president Kurmanbek Bakiyev clashed with backers of the interim government in the southern cities of Osh and Jalalabad.
Bakiyev was ousted in April when riots broke out across the country. At least 85 people were killed and thousands of others injured in those clashes.
