By Aigerim Tugunbaeva
BISHKEK, May 12 (Reuters) - Kyrgyzstan authorities have charged eight people, including powerful ex-security chief Kamchybek Tashiev, with plotting to seize power from President Sadyr Japarov, who has consolidated power in the historically volatile central Asian country.
Tashiev had ruled the former Soviet republic of 7 million in a de facto tandem with Japarov since the pair were swept to power in street protests in 2020, until his abrupt ouster in January.
Tashiev's lawyer, Ikramidin Aytkulov, confirmed the charges in a post on Facebook, saying the trial would be held behind closed doors with reporting banned.
There was no information as to the identities of the other seven people charged, but several ousted officials seen as allies of Tashiev, including a former speaker of parliament, have been interrogated alongside him in recent weeks.
The charges carry a prison sentence of up to 20 years. Tashiev has made no public comment on the accusations.
The move against Tashiev, an influential powerbroker in Kyrgyzstan’s ethnically mixed south, could risk fresh instability.
A resource-poor, mountainous country heavily dependent on remittances from migrants working in Russia, Kyrgyzstan has traditionally been the most unstable of the Central Asian republics, with presidents driven from office by protests in 2005, 2010 and 2020.
Japarov and Tashiev’s partnership, which united rival elites from the fractious country’s north and south, brought tightened political control, including crackdowns on the opposition and independent media.
The pair were buoyed by accelerated economic growth, among the fastest in Central Asia, partly due to Russian trade routes redirected via Kyrgyzstan after Western sanctions over the Ukraine war.
(Reporting by Aigerim Turgunbaeva, Writing by Felix Light; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
