Leaked dispatches reveal need to maintain supply route in state riddled with organised crime, forced labour and torture
The post-Soviet state of Uzbekistan is a nightmarish world of "rampant corruption", organised crime, forced labour in the cotton fields, and torture, according to the leaked cables.
But the secret dispatches released by WikiLeaks reveal that the US tries to keep President Islam Karimov sweet because he allows a crucial US military supply line to run into Afghanistan, known as the northern distribution network (NDN).
Many dispatches focus on the behaviour of Karimov's glamorous and highly controversial daughter Gulnara, who is bluntly described by them as "the single most hated person in the country".
She allegedly bullied her way into gaining a slice of virtually every lucrative business in the central Asian state and is viewed, they say, as a "robber baron". Granted diplomatic status by her father, Gulnara allegedly lives much of the time in Geneva, where her holding company, Zeromax, was registered at the time, or in Spain.
She also sings pop songs, designs jewellery and is listed as a professor at Tashkent's University of World Economy and Diplomacy.
The British ambassador in Tashkent, Rupert Joy, was criticised by human rights groups in October when he helped boost Gulnara's image by appearing with her on a fashion show platform.
But the US secret cables go some way towards explaining western ambivalence. They detail how the dictatorial president recently flew into a rage because the US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, presented a Women of Courage award in Washington to a newly released Uzbek human rights campaigner, Mutabar Tadjibayeva.
Karimov's displeasure was conveyed in "icy tones", which alarmed the embassy: "We have a number of important issues on the table right now, including the Afghanistan transit (NDN) framework."
On 18 March 2009, the US ambassador, Richard Norland, submitted to a personal tongue-lashing from Karimov with an "implicit threat to suspend transit of cargo for US forces in Afghanistan via the Northern Distribution Network".
Norland claimed to have calmed Karimov down on that occasion, but warned Washington: "Clearly, pressuring him (especially publicly) could cost us transit."
Gulnara, wryly dubbed the "first daughter" by the diplomats, appeared on the embassy radar in 2004.
Describing trips to sample Tashkent's raucous nightlife, diplomats said she had been spotted at 3am joining her younger sister Lola in a booth surrounded by four large bodyguards.
Lola had arrived in a Porsche Cayenne four-wheel drive – "one of a kind for Tashkent" – and danced all evening with her "thuggish-looking boyfriend" in a club she appeared to own. It served large quantities of imported hard alcohol, the diplomats noted, "which is against the law".
Dispatches over the next five years chronicle Gulnara's extraordinary rise, allegedly making local businesses offers they could not refuse.
US businessmen claimed, for example, that after they rejected Gulnara's offer to take a share in their Skytel mobile phone firm, "the company's frequency has been jammed by an Uzbek government agency".
Gulnara acquired interests in the crude oil contracts of Zeromax in "a deal with [a] local mafia boss", the embassy said. She also got hold of shares in the Coca-Cola bottling franchise after it was subjected to a tax investigation, they claimed.
"Most Uzbeks see Karimova as a greedy, power-hungry individual who uses her father to crush business people or anyone else who stands in her way … She remains the single most hated person in the country."
Neil Livingstone, a Washington businessman closely involved with Zeromax, denied to the Guardian that Gulnara had interests in the company, which has recently had its assets seized in Uzbekistan, following unfavourable publicity alleging corruption by the Karimov family.
He said: "Had we had the relationship with the government or the daughter that was rumoured … we would not now be in serious financial straits. I have never met the president's daughter or even spoken to her."
Gulnara did not respond to requests for comment, sent to her own website and to the Uzbek embassies in both London and Washington, but she has reportedly denied claims that she fully or partly owned Zeromax.
The US diplomats paint a harsh picture of overall life in Uzbekistan, largely corroborating allegations made by the former UK ambassador Craig Murray, who was forced out of his job in 2004 after denouncing the regime.
The US embassy reports there are "close connections between organised crime and the government of Uzbekistan". Both public and private sector jobs are routinely "bought", they say.
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