The government is betraying signs of not knowing quite how to run a state of emergency – especially one instated to defend a population against an invisible virus.
The local hospital provided first aid, but before long, groups of aggressive men turned up, looking for Dungans. Thousands fled over the nearby border to Kyrgyzstan.
Agriculture accounts for 15 percent of the Kyrgyz economy. Yet the lack of coordination means many farmers are barely able to survive, let alone export anything.
Land swaps or giveaways have historically proved politically risky in Kyrgyzstan. The government is, accordingly, stressing what it is calling advantageous terms.
The officer who negotiated the end to a bloody standoff with Kyrgyzstan’s former president is now being held for abuse of office. The flimsy evidence suggests the government needed a fall guy.