US Out Of Uzbekistan ?  

It seems the tenuous US grip on central Asia is meeting some resistance, with the Chinese and Russians apparently manouevring their ejection from Uzbekistan. I wonder what colour revolution will try to force ole "Crockpot" Karimov out ? No doubt there will be quite a few rounds of the great game still to come - and I suspect the Uzbeks are likely to be the losers from it all.

Uzbekistan has asked the US to withdraw its forces from a key air base used to back troops fighting in Afghanistan amid a wider effort by China and Russia to restore their undisputed domination of Central Asia. The decision, delivered in a diplomatic note on Friday, gives the US six months to pull about 800 troops plus C-130 "Spookey" and helicopter gunships out of the Karshi-Khanabad base.

The former Soviet airfield was taken over by the Americans shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks in the US to launch a campaign against al-Qaeda and the Taliban. The move comes amid friction between Washington and the Uzbek President, Islam Karimov, over US demands for an independent inquiry into an uprising at Andizhan, in the east of the country, that was put down by Uzbek soldiers in May.

The eviction order follows a call last month by a regional grouping sponsored by China and Russia for all Western forces to leave bases in Central Asia. Leaders of the Shanghai Co-operation Agreement - which groups Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan with the two big powers - made the appeal at their summit in Astana, Kazakhstan, saying large -scale military operations against terrorism had come to an end in Afghanistan.

The pressure to dislodge Western forces from the oil-rich region has been backed by promises of substantial aid and investment by China, which gave Mr Karimov a warm welcome in Beijing shortly after the Andizhan crackdown. The US Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, made a hastily organised trip last week to Kyrgyzstan, where about 1200 US and South Korean military personnel are stationed. He said later that Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan would continue hosting US forces.