Ousted Kyrgyz President Askar Akayev said Tuesday that he is willing to talk
with the new Kyrgyz parliament, hours after the upper house of Kyrgyzstan's
previous parliament agreed to cede power to it, the Interfax news agency
reported.
"If security is guaranteed to me, I am willing to start dialogue (with the
new parliament) so that life in Kyrgyzstan can return to the constitutional path
and so that the problem of electing a new president can be resolved in the legal
and constitutional framework," Akayev said in an interview to be published by
Rossiiskaya Gazeta on Wednesday, excerpts of which were released by Interfax.
In Akayev's view the latest events in Kyrgyzstan have "resulted from speeding
up democratic processes" which were prompted by "some international
organizations."
"In Georgia and Ukraine, which are closer to Europe, these revolutions ended
peacefully. But in our case, as you see, they have ended in a horrible
nightmare, vandalism, and robberies, because our opposition is not democratic.
It used criminal forces and trained fighters to seize power," the president
noted.
Akayev said he did not originally plan to leave Kyrgyzstan and indicated that
somebody had wanted to physically remove him.
He said he personally witnessed the assault on the government complex and his
close associates getting gravely wounded.
According to the president, his security guards were prepared to use weapons
if the crowd had tried to take the president hostage.
But "in this situation, it was not important only to protect my life. We
faced the danger of a civil war, which would have definitely involved countless
victims. Proceeding from these humane reasons, I decided to leave the country
for some time," he said.
Calling the seizure of power in Kyrgyzstan unconstitutional, Akayev said
"democracy in Kyrgyzstan is in danger today, because those who committed this
unconstitutional seizure of power are acting outside the law."
Akayev called on related parities to "return the process to the
constitutional path," as "it is very important for Kyrgyzstan's future progress
and for its image in the world, saying "this is the solution that I
see."