A Uighur Money-Launderer's Murder in Istanbul

https://www.rferl.org/a/man-who-exposed-kyrgyz-smuggling-scheme-was-hunted-by-contract-killers/30940261.html

I cannot be sure what the true nature of this story is but given the way it's being framed by RFE/RL and the involvement of outlets such as Bellingcat I am led to believe that it is something of a false expose', serving as a means of cover-up.

Is this a story about Chinese corruption at work in Kyrgyzstan? Some outlets have framed it that way. Interestingly RFE/RL did not and yet I am also less than satisfied with how they are presenting it. They're on to something but at the same time it's as if they're holding back.

The region is abuzz with activity. Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan straddle the borders of Xinjiang and are the logical places for running a Uighur insurgency – one that China is certainly expecting. The US has sent a very strong signal in removing the al Qaeda affiliated East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) from the official terrorism list. It's a signal that they're going to receive official (if quiet) support. It's even a step beyond the tacit support the US provided for al Nusra (al Qaeda) in Syria.

We have a Uighur money launderer connected to bagmen and al Nusra/al Qaeda Islamist militants in Syria – the forces being backed by the United States in its war against Bashir Assad. Many of these same fighters have been moving in and out of Europe through the Turkish-Balkans pipeline. There are also connections to Libya that keep popping up in the news.

This whole operation points to a smuggling operation connecting Syrian al Nusra cells with Central Asia. The most likely commodities are weapons and fighters and the large sums of money it will take to move them clandestinely into the region. To get them into Kyrgyzstan one would need government acquiescence or in its absence one would have to either bribe government officials to look the other way as planes land at rural airfields or to border officials to close their eyes to a pipeline of men and materiel coming up from Afghanistan – a place that would be easy to shuttle men and weapons in and out of especially if facilitated by US/NATO troops.

Something happened and Saimaiti was killed for whistleblowing (he went to the wrong people) or there may have been some side issue of corruption on his part. Clearly Matraimov is being portrayed as the villain in the story. Is he the corrupt official that got too greedy and is being fingered as a result? Is he the patsy? In reality this is probably tied in with the nation's political upheaval and ongoing struggle for power. The politics tore apart alliances and allegiances and broke the clandestine network. The story got out. Matraimov's allies are tied to recently ousted president Sooronbay Jeenbekov and so one wonders if the story is to some degree directed toward the ex-president and his faction?

RFE/RL will report on it and yet not provide the whole story or in relying on Bellingcat (which continues to play an important if dubious and controversial role in this and other conflict zones) will it simply report what is already out there and yet suppress the fuller story?

This piece is meant to indicate that the hard investigative journalism is being done. The story is being covered. Except it isn't. It's only scratching the service and trying to hang the whole thing around the neck of one corrupt official (and the Chinese of course) and yet given the scope of what's happening Matraimov is at best a medium-size fish. If the investigation stops with him, the investigation turns into a cover-up. That said RFE/RL could easily spin the story into an anti-Beijing piece but in printing this as it stands, they have left the door open to wider consideration. The journalists aren't always micromanaged. It will be interesting to see how the story continues to develop.

At present I think the reason Matraimov is being targeted is that he was double-crossing some of the people above him and acting as a Chinese agent. It would be easy enough to believe that this whole story is about China and a corruption scandal related to OBOR but that doesn't explain the Syria-Islamist connection – which points to the West. Given that the US is certainly planning to support a Uighur insurgency, the story forces me to look less toward Beijing and more toward places like Langley, Incirlik, or Ankara.

I think this story is but the tip of the iceberg, a tiny window into a larger darker world and a series of operations and interests that stretch across Eurasia. There are no conclusions and indeed they may never be known but it's interesting, and helps one begin to understand what is happening in Central Asia and how the region is plugged into the wider scope of geopolitical struggle.

See also:

http://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2020/10/kyrgyzstans-latest-round-of-unrest.html