Kyrgyzstan, << kihr guh STAHN or KIHR guh `stahn` >> is a mountainous country in central Asia. Bishkek is its capital and largest city. The official languages are Kyrgyz and Russian. Kyrgyzstan became an independent country in 1991. It had previously been part of the Soviet Union for about 70 years.
Government.
Kyrgyzstan adopted a series of constitutional changes from 1993 to 2021. The changes alternated between granting greater power to the president and to parliament. The 2021 constitution increased the president’s authority. The president, elected by the people, serves as Kyrgyzstan’s head of state. The president selects the cabinet members. The chairman of the Cabinet of Ministers heads the cabinet. The nation’s 90-member parliament, called the Jogorku Kengesh, makes the laws. The people elect the members to five-year terms. 
Kyrgyzstan is divided into seven oblasts (regions) and the separate cities of Bishkek and Osh. The Supreme Court is the country’s highest court.
People.
About two-thirds of Kyrgyzstan’s people belong to the Kyrgyz ethnic group. They speak Kyrgyz, a Turkic language. Most of the ethnic Kyrgyz live in rural areas and live by herding and farming. Ethnic Russians and Uzbeks are the next two largest population groups. Other ethnic groups include Dungan (ethnic Chinese Muslims) and Ukrainians. Most of the Kyrgyz and the Uzbeks are Muslims. Most of the people of other ethnic groups are Christians.
Among the ethnic Kyrgyz, tribal organizations and large kinship units called clans play important roles in social customs. Each tribe consists of a number of clans. A Kyrgyz clan includes all people who are descended from a common ancestor through their father’s side of the family. Senior clan members function as community leaders. Traditionally, tribal leaders have been the most respected members of Kyrgyz society. They hold most of the country’s regional and national government offices.
Kyrgyz social life is centered around the family. Members of an extended family live together in one household. The household might include parents, children, married sons and their children, and other relatives. The Kyrgyz tend to marry people in their own clan.
Most urban dwellers live in concrete apartment buildings or stucco houses. Most of the rural people live in mud-brick houses in villages and are involved in farming. But some people raise livestock in a nomadic lifestyle—that is, they move their herds from place to place—at least part of the year. These people live in portable, tentlike yurts, made of a round wooden frame covered with felt.
The Kyrgyz people wear traditional garments as well as clothing similar to that worn by North Americans and Europeans. Traditional clothing for men includes a padded or a sheepskin coat, boots, and a white felt hat with black flaps. Married women often wear a white turban made of a long scarf.
Traditional Kyrgyz foods include shurpa (mutton and vegetable soup) and besh barmak (lamb and noodles with broth). Popular milk products include cheese, ayran (a yogurtlike drink), and kumiss (fermented mare’s milk).
The Kyrgyz people enjoy folk songs and dancing. The recitation of epics (poems about heroic events) is a traditional Kyrgyz event. One of their most famous epics is the Manas, a poem describing Kyrgyz history.
The government requires children to attend school from the ages of 7 to 17. The country has several universities.
Land and climate.
The Tian Shan and Alay mountains cover most of Kyrgyzstan. About three-quarters of the country lies at an altitude of more than 4,950 feet (1,500 meters) above sea level. Peak Pobedy, the highest mountain, rises 24,406 feet (7,439 meters) in the Tian Shan along the border with China. Only about 15 percent of Kyrgyzstan is below 3,000 feet (915 meters) above sea level. These areas include plains and mountain valleys. Most people live in these relatively low places. The chief rivers include the Naryn, Shu, and Talas.
Temperatures in Kyrgyzstan vary with altitude. Summers are warm and dry in the valleys and plains, and cool in the mountains. July temperatures average 61 to 75 °F (16 to 24 °C) in the valleys and plains and 46 to 54 °F (8 to 12 °C) in the mountains. Winters are chilly in the lowlands, but extremely cold in the mountains. January temperatures average 21 to 24 °F (–6 to –4 °C) in the lowlands and –4 to 7 °F (–20 to –14 °C) in the mountains.
Economy.
Agriculture accounts for much of Kyrgyzstan’s economic production. Livestock raising is the chief agricultural activity. Beef and dairy cattle and sheep are the most important kinds of livestock. People graze yaks in the high mountains. Less than 10 percent of the land is suitable for raising crops. Farmers rely on irrigation to provide water for most crop growth. Chief agricultural products include apples, cotton, onions, potatoes, tomatoes, and wheat.
Manufacturing is also important to the country’s economy. Chief manufactured products include clothing and textiles, construction materials, food products, and machinery. Bishkek is an important industrial center. Gold is the leading mined product. Mines in Kyrgyzstan also yield coal, mercury, natural gas, petroleum, uranium, and other minerals.
Kyrgyzstan imports more than it exports. It imports food and beverage products, machinery, petroleum and other mineral products, and pharmaceuticals (medicinal products). Kyrgyzstan’s main exports include clothing, gold and other minerals, and machinery. The country’s chief trading partners include China, Kazakhstan, and Russia.
Radio and television stations operate under both private and state ownership. Internet usage has grown rapidly in the country since the early 2000’s.
History.
Nomads who raised livestock were the first people to live in what is now Kyrgyzstan. They settled into the region from various parts of northern Asia. Beginning in about the 700’s, Turkic tribes began to move into the region. Waves of Turkic migrations continued into the 1100’s. Mongols conquered the area in the early 1200’s. The Mongols established regions called khanates, which were ruled by chieftains. Some of the country’s people are descended from the Turkic and Mongol tribes. In the 1600’s, Islamic missionaries called Sufis brought Islam, the Muslim religion, to the region.
Kyrgyzstan remained primarily under the domination of Mongol peoples until 1758, when China gained control. The Chinese maintained loose rule over the Kyrgyz until the 1830’s, when the oppressive Khanate of Qoqon conquered the Kyrgyz people.
The Russian Empire began to expand into central Asia in the mid-1800’s. It defeated the Khanate of Qoqon in 1876 and made the region a Russian province. The Russian government took control of vast areas of land and encouraged Russian, Ukrainian, and other Slavic peasants to settle there. Tens of thousands of foreign agricultural workers came. The settlement restricted grazing land and lowered the Kyrgyz standard of living. In 1916, the Kyrgyz staged an unsuccessful rebellion against the Russians. Thousands were killed on both sides, and as many as 150,000 Kyrgyz people fled to China.
Soviet rule.
In 1917, revolutionaries known as Bolsheviks (later called Communists) seized control of the Russian government. The Soviet Union was formed in 1922 under Russian Communist leadership. In 1924, the Soviets made Kyrgyzstan an autonomous oblast (self-governing region) of the Soviet Union called the Kara-Kyrgyz Autonomous Oblast. In 1936, the region became a republic called the Kyrgyz Soviet Socialist Republic.
Soviet rule changed many aspects of life in Kyrgyzstan. The Soviet Union established a powerful Communist government and took control of all industry and land in the country. For hundreds of years, large numbers of rural Kyrgyz had been nomadic herders who raised livestock in mountain valleys in the summer and moved them to the foothills in the winter. In the 1930’s, the Soviet Union set up government farms and forced the herders to live on them.
Under the Soviets, the Communist Party became Kyrgyzstan’s only legal political party. In addition, Soviet law forbade certain traditional cultural practices, such as religious instruction. However, the Soviet government helped develop agriculture and industry in Kyrgyzstan. School and health care systems also were improved.
Independence.
The Soviet government maintained strict control of all aspects of life until the late 1980’s. In 1990, Kyrgyzstan declared that its laws overruled those of the Soviet Union. In August 1991, conservative Communist officials failed in an attempt to overthrow Soviet Union President Mikhail S. Gorbachev. During the upheaval that followed, Kyrgyzstan and several other republics declared their independence. In October, voters in the newly independent Kyrgyzstan elected Askar Akayev president. In December, Kyrgyzstan joined other republics in a loose association called the Commonwealth of Independent States. The Soviet Union was formally dissolved on December 25.
After declaring independence, Kyrgyzstan began moving toward creating a free enterprise economy. The government introduced a new currency and began selling farmland and businesses to private owners. The government also opened the economy to foreign investment.
Challenges and reforms.
Problems facing the new nation included tensions between ethnic groups. In 1990, conflicts between the Kyrgyz and the Uzbeks over territorial claims and other disputes led to violence. The government declared a state of emergency, which was ended in 1995.
Akayev was reelected president in 1995 and again in 2000. In early 2005, widespread antigovernment protests erupted in Kyrgyzstan. The protesters claimed that parliamentary elections held that year had been rigged in favor of supporters of Akayev. The protests led to a political crisis. The outgoing parliament named Kurmanbek Bakiev, a former prime minister and opposition leader, as interim president and prime minister of the country. In July, a presidential election was held, and Bakiev won a landslide victory.
In response to the protests calling for reform, Bakiev signed a new constitution in late 2006 that limited presidential power and gave increased authority to parliament. In 2007, however, he amended the new constitution, restoring some of the presidential powers he had lost. Kyrgyzstan’s Constitutional Court ruled that the new constitution was illegal, and the previous constitution was reinstated. Bakiev was reelected in 2009.
Violent antigovernment protests in Bishkek in April 2010 caused Bakiev to flee the country. Opposition politicians accused him of corruption and established an interim government. In June, ethnic tensions led to violence between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in southern Kyrgyzstan. Experts estimated that some 400,000 people, mostly Uzbeks, fled the region. International investigators estimated that more than 400 people, also mostly Uzbeks, were killed in the violence.
The interim government held a referendum in June in which voters approved a new constitution. The constitution limited the power of the president and increased the power of the parliament and prime minister. Parliamentary elections were held in October. In 2011, former Prime Minister Almazbek Atambaev was elected president.
In a 2016 referendum, voters approved constitutional amendments that transferred some governmental power from the president to the prime minister. Former Prime Minister Sooronbay Jeenbekov was elected president in 2017 in the country’s first peaceful transfer of power since independence.
In 2020, opposition groups challenged the results of the October parliamentary election, in which Jeenbekov’s supporters won the most seats. In response to the unrest, both the prime minister and the president resigned. Opposition leader Sadyr Japarov briefly took over both offices but then resigned so he could run for president. Japarov won the January 2021 presidential election. A referendum in April approved constitutional changes that returned to a government with greater presidential authority.
See also Bishkek ; Commonwealth of Independent States ; Tian Shan .
