The interview keeps paying out. On Friday it was the corrected arithmetic of confiscated billions, which ran in that day’s edition. The tranches that landed through Friday and Saturday answer a question Bishkek has asked since spring: what happened between the president and the man who ran his security state.
Sadyr Japarov’s account, given to the journalist Ali Toktakunov: he had planned to forgo a second term and, in his words, wanted to make Kamchy president and retire himself. He changed his mind, he says, because Tashiev was not ready: he could not control an inner circle that allegedly kept part of the assets confiscated from criminal groups; a letter from respected elders arrived; parliament was splitting into factions. He dismissed his ally by telephone while Tashiev was abroad for medical treatment, and there will be no state post: the former security chief should rest and reflect. Japarov confirmed he will run in January 2027.
The same conversation disposed of the head of Kumtor. Boltuuruk was dismissed, by the president’s telling, over diesel bought for the mine at 80 som a litre against a market near 60, an office lease near $1 million a month and a $6,000 chair; prosecutors have made detentions, and damages, Japarov says, were repaid.
I wanted to make Kamchy president and retire myself.
One more line travels well beyond Kyrgyzstan. Japarov said Beijing initially refused to start the China Kyrgyzstan Uzbekistan railway without Russia’s consent. The project’s public history is one of financing rounds and tunnelling percentages; until Friday it did not include a head of state saying on the record that Moscow held a veto over it. The admission arrives two weeks before Bishkek hosts the SCO summit, with both presidents it concerns expected at the table.
All of it traces to a single primary, the interview itself, carried consistently across Kyrgyz, Uzbek and Kazakh outlets. Tashiev’s side of the story does not yet exist in public.