OSH, Kyrgyzstan — Barely two weeks after ethnic purges left many minority Uzbek communities in smoldering ruin, about two-thirds of Kyrgyz stan’s voters went to the polls Sunday to peacefully and overwhelmingly approve a new constitution they hoped would bring stability to the Central Asian nation.
Kyrgyzstan’s interim government had pressed on with the vote even though many of the 400,000 ethnic Uzbeks forced to flee have yet to return to their homes and neighborhoods. The result gave legitimacy to the provisional government backed by most Uzbeks, though some of those displaced by violence were unable to vote Sunday.
The vote — supported by the U.N., the U.S. and Russia — is seen as an important step on the road to democracy for the interim government, which came to power after former President Kurmanbek Bakiyev was ousted in April following deadly street protests.
Interim President Roza Otunbayeva said she now would be inaugurated as a caretaker president and form her government. Its members will form a lawmaking assembly that will pass the necessary legislation until parliamentary elections in October.
“It will not be an interim but a legal and legitimate government,” Otunbayeva said. “We are leaving the word ‘interim’ behind.”
Some 2.7 million people were eligible to vote, and turnout was nearly 70 percent, the Central Election Commission said.
Rampages by ethnic-majority Kyrgyz mobs in southern Kyrgyzstan this month killed as many as 2,000 people and forced 400,000 ethnic Uzbeks to temporarily flee. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe had 25 observers monitoring the vote, but none was in Osh or Jalal-Abad — the cities where the violence was centered — because it still considered them too dangerous.
The United States and Russia have military bases in Kyrgyzstan. The U.S. Manas air base is a key transit center for U.S. and NATO troops flying in and out of Afghanistan.
Otunbayeva said Sunday that her government will keep the country’s foreign policy unchanged, maintaining close ties with ex-Soviet neighbors in Central Asia, as well as Russia and China.
“We will also continue our partnerships with the countries of the European Union and also with the United States,” she said.
