Whiskey in hand, Craig Murray appeared at ease doing what most ambassadors do: entertaining guests on the terrace by his swimming pool.
If on that spring evening in Tashkent two years ago – during the EBRD's first-ever meeting in the central Asian capital – Murray had the slightest suspicion of what would happen next, his casual demeanor didn't let it show.
He left the Foreign Office last year in controversial circumstances in a blaze of publicity, having criticized the government of Uzbek President Islam Karimov. The 46-year-old is now back in London, but is determined to continue highlighting the autocratic nature of Uzbekistan's regime and what he claims are the double standards of western governments, including his own, that continue to back it.
controversial figure
The ex-envoy's stance is uncompromising: "This [Uzbekistan's] regime is just so extreme. It really is a totalitarian society," he says. It's a regime, he adds, "that the west ought to have dissociated itself from much more sharply that it did – or continues to do. When I arrived in Uzbekistan my fellow ambassadors all said 'we don't mention human rights here' – it's just not done."
Murray first emerged as a controversial figure in late 2002, when he highlighted instances of people being apparently boiled to death in jail.
The continued use by western governments of Uzbek intelligence, allegedly
procured from victims of torture, was
at the heart of Murray's indignation.
The US has hailed the impoverished agrarian state of 26 million as an ally in its "war on terror", a policy Murray says is "dangerously misconceived."
"This is morally, legally and practically wrong," he wrote in his final memo to the Foreign Office. "It exposes as hypocritical our post-Abu Ghraib pronouncements and undermines our moral standing."
Violence anew
Now, says Murray, heightened tension across the region is almost certainly strengthening Karimov's reign. In a sign of escalating unease, violence erupted again last week in Uzbekistan – the worst in the ex-Soviet state since bombings shook the capital last year.
This time, unrest hit the densely
populated Ferghana valley, one of the poorest and most volatile Muslim regions in central Asia. Soldiers opened fire
on up to 4,000 people, many of them armed, who were protesting the detention of 23 men, accused by the government of Islamic extremism. It is not known how many people died though it could be more than 500.
Tensions are also running high in the capital Tashkent, where police shot and killed a man they mistakenly thought was a suicide bomber outside the Israeli Embassy in the Uzbek capital last week. The man was carrying wooden objects that appeared to be explosives, according to a police official. Last year suicide bombers targeted both the Israeli and US embassies.
"Uzbekistan is unlike any other state in central Asia. It has half the population of the region. This is the 'daddy' state,
if you will," says Murray. "If violence erupts here it cannot do so without spreading to neighbouring regions. I'm not expecting all of central Asia to go
up in flames, but the seeds of radicalism have been sown."
key US ally
Murray believes that the situation is
deteriorating. After September 11, 2001, Uzbekistan emerged as a key US ally in "the war on terror", and hosts hundreds of US troops. The problem, as Murray sees it, is that the legitimacy US backing
confers on the regime will only intensify anti-western sentiment.
"They [the population] see the regime backed by the US. The danger is that radicalism will take an anti-western stance." Yet thousands of Muslims have been jailed in Uzbekistan over the past
few years, with many claiming unfair treatment, inflaming anger against
Karimov's rule. The government argues that these people are members of radical Islamic groups.
At the end of March, internal tensions reached fever pitch in neighbouring
Kyrgyzstan when opponents of the government stormed and ransacked the offices of former president Askar Akayev, ending his 15-year rule. Echoes of the protests that toppled Akayev have since been felt in Uzbekistan's Ferghana
valley, prompting speculation that revolution could spread to central Asia's most populous country. Murray, however, says that such a probability is unlikely.
"The important thing about the Kyrgyz revolution, if you can call it that, was that it occurred in what was the most liberal state in central Asia," says Murray, who points out that the opposition was allowed to compete in them, albeit with little chance of winning.
"The comparative liberalism of his [Akayev] regime created the conditions for it to be possible for revolution to take place," he says. "It would be wrong to think that this could happen elsewhere in central Asia, especially in Uzbekistan."
grim prognosis
Murray's prognosis is grim: as long as Karimov and his allies remain in power, the prospects for development on a political, social or economic level is nil. "As long as these leaders are in power there will never be meaningful reform. You have to wait for a change of regime."
But for all his criticism of the west's stance towards Karimov's regime, would Murray back forced regime change in Uzbekistan? "Absolutely not," he says.
"I was against the war in Iraq and I
would be against similar actions
[in Uzbekistan]."
What is needed, says Murray, is a concerted effort on the part of western governments to take the moral upper hand. "I would like to see a move towards smart sanctions against Uzbekistan," he says, pointing out that, for instance, a boycott of Uzbek cotton, the county's primary export, could end up benefiting the majority of the good's farmers, who would no longer be "enslaved cotton pickers". He says: "Pressure from the US cotton lobby would be a good start."
president speaks out
Also encouraging from Murray's point of view is the EBRD's stance towards the central Asian state, since its annual meeting in Tashkent two years ago. "I thought [EBRD President] Lemierre took an excellent line in speaking out against Karimov," he says.
The bank's chief used his annual address to voice live on public television his grave concern over accusations of human rights abuses – criticism that had never before been aired. "I don't think without me the pressure for the EBRD to act as they did would have been so strong," he says.
Although the ERBD has since moved to restrict its lending to the nation, "sadly we've seen since then institutions like
the Asian Development Bank coming in and making loans, undermining the EBRD's efforts."
So what has Murray's relentless criticism achieved? "Not a very huge amount," he says. "I think the situation will eventually end in violence."