Bishkek, June 23: The United States and Kyrgyzstan have reached a deal for using a Kyrgyz airport to transport US non-lethal military supplies to Afghanistan, a senior Kyrgyz official said on Tuesday, four months after the country said US troops would be evicted.
The accord to use Manas airport as “centre of transit shipments” would fall short of US hopes of maintaining the facility as a full-fledged military airbase. But it would provide a much needed logistical support base as the US-led coalition ramps up operations against the increasing bold Taliban and al Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan.
A tentative deal was agreed upon Monday and a Kyrgyz Parliamentary committee was due to consider the agreement Tuesday, said the official, who asked not to be named since the announcement had not yet been made.
However, there was unlikely to be any strong opposition to the deal, which goes before the full Parliament after it gets backing from the committee.
The US officials at the Embassy in the Kyrgyz capital, Bishkek, said they were unable to provide immediate comment on the deal.
President Kurmanbek Bakiyev stunned Washington in February by announcing that US forces would be evicted from Manas, saying Washington wasn’t paying enough and citing other concerns.
The United States pays USD 17.4 million annual rent for Manas, but according to US officials, it contributes USD 150 million to the local economy every year through service contracts and aid packages. And US Defence Secretary Robert Gates had said that Washington would be willing to pay more, within reason.
With the August 18 eviction date looming, however, Kyrgyz officials have suggested in recent weeks they might reconsider the decision.
Earlier this month, Afghan leader Hamid Karzai appealed to Kyrgyzstan to let coalition forces continue using Manas.
US forces have had access to Manas outside Bishkek since 2001. The base — a transit point for 15,000 troops and 500 tons of cargo each month to and from Afghanistan — became even more important to the Afghan war effort after neighbouring Uzbekistan evicted US troops from a base there.
Bakiyev’s announcement in February came hours after Moscow, which has long been wary of the US presence in Central Asia, pledged more than USD 2 billion in aid, loans and investment for Kyrgyzstan. That led US officials to suggest that Moscow pressured Bakiyev to kick out the Americans.
Russia also has an air base in Kyrgyzstan.
Analysts and opposition politicians have said in recent weeks that Russia might be linking its backing for the US in Kyrgyzstan to other nettlesome issues in US-Russian relations, such as NATO expansion into former Soviet republics or US plans for placing a missile defence shield in Central Europe.
“This decision tells us that the Kyrgyz government is not in charge of its own foreign policy, but is just a plaything in the hands of the Kremlin,” Bakyt Beshimov, leader of the Opposition Social Democrat party faction, said on Tuesday.
–Agencies