The Next Phase in Kyrgyzstan’s Battle Against Corruption

The head of Kyrgyzstan’s State Committee for National Security, Kamchybek Tashiev, started 2025 off with a pledge to “destroy” corruption in Kyrgyzstan. Tashiev’s optimism is built on the passage in late 2024 of a new package of laws that ostensibly heighten punishment for corruption by eliminating the option for a corrupt official to pay their way out of jail time and imposing a lifetime ban on holding public office for those convicted of corruption.

That the tandem – a term for the seeming joint government formed by elected President Sadyr Japarov and his un-elected security chief, Tashiev – itself promoted “economic amnesty” early in its tenure is a deep irony.

Can Kyrgyzstan’s populist duo eradicate corruption? Are they truly trying to? Or is the campaign against corruption a convenient cover for the consolidation fo power?

Goodbye Economic Amnesty

In late October 2020, then-acting President Japarov unveiled his grand plan to get a grasp on corruption in Kyrgyzstan: “economic amnesty.” Former officials who had enriched themselves through corruption were invited to come clean and pay the state back, no questions asked, no jail time served. The initial announcement suggested a 30-day window, but it became an entrenched pathway around legal ramifications for corruption for those willing, and able, to pay up.

The system is better known now as kusturizatsia, a term that comes from the word for “vomiting” in Kyrgyz. It conjures the appropriate visual.

Over the last four years, no figure has capitalized on kusturizatsia to a greater extent than the infamous Raimbek Matraimov, a former deputy customs head implicated in a massive scheme to profit from smuggling across the Kyrgyz border. Matraimov has been repeatedly arrested and repeatedly released after paying fines.

Most recently, in mid-December Matraimov wriggled free again after admitting guilt to illegal border crossing and hooliganism and paying a 100,000 som ($1,152) fine.

The charges to which Matraimov admitted guilt were far removed from the allegations of an assassination plot that precipitated his detention and extradition from Azerbaijan in March 2024. A money laundering charge also disappeared.

When Matraimov was released from detention on bail in November, Tashiev told parliament that the release was justified.

“Matraimov was released after paying $200 million, this is not $2 million and not $20 million,” Tashiev said, adding that Matraimov had previously paid 2.5 billion soms to the state. “In total, he paid 19.5 billion soms. Of course, all this is not cash, including property…After the payment of the funds, keeping him in prison was of no use to either the state or himself.”

Then in early December, Tashiev introduced to parliament a proposed law – which he had said his office was preparing back in September – to eliminate fines for corruption charges. Of course, by the end Matrimov was not facing corruption charges. How convenient.

Hello Collective Punishment

On December 31, Japrov signed into law a bill passed days earlier by the parliament that ends the era of economic amnesty. The new law, which went into effect on January 1, removes provisions in the criminal code regarding the paying of fines for corruption charges, and adds provisions that ban those convicted of corruption from holding certain public positions. The law also added a provision providing for an individual accused of corruption to admit guilt, pay damages, and receive a halving of the relevant prison term.

“Our main goal is to eradicate corruption in Kyrgyzstan in 2025-2026, to destroy it. And we must achieve this goal,” Tashiev said in his January 1 a live video on Facebook. “Why am I talking about this? Many of you probably think that ‘you will not overcome corruption, it is impossible to eradicate it, it is difficult.’ Yes, that’s right. It is very difficult. And it is not easy to fight it. But we set ourselves the goal of eradicating it and destroying it.”

He went on to state: “From now on, persons arrested for corruption will be sentenced to prison. In addition, their close relatives, parents, spouses will be suspended from public service. They themselves will be deprived of the right to work in government agencies for life. This is the severity of the [new] law.”

The statement reeks of collective punishment: That is, the punishing of individuals who have, themselves, done nothing wrong but are associated with someone who did.

The Old Ways Die Hard

Musurkul Kabylbekov, an analyst interviewed by RFE/RL’s Kyrgyz Service, Radio Azattyk, characterized concerns about the new laws – and Tashiev’s bluster – well:

“What scares me in this situation is that because of the zealous performers who, after the law is passed, will have to show results to the top management, nothing good will come of this for civil servants. They are already scared to the limit, all the proactive ones are leaving, and the weak and weak-willed remain...

Corruption is very multifaceted and has different forms. In order to eradicate it, civil service must be prestigious and well-paid. In developed countries, working for the state is considered the highest achievement. And such a person will hold on to his position and will never commit illegal actions. Of course, corruption exists there, but to a certain extent, not threatening the safety of society….

Others interviewed by Azattyk noted the necessity of transparency – and the freedom of speech – in confronting corruption. In both of these areas, Kyrgyzstan has regressed under Japarov and Tashiev’s rule. In particular, investigative outlets like Kloop and Temirov Live that have reporting on allegations of corruption involving Japarov, Tashiev, and their families have found themselves shut down and shut out.

As is often the case, when authoritarian regimes, or populist leaders with authoritarian tendencies, pursue a grand anti-corruption campaign, it is more about politics than pennies.