Word: russia
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Kyrgyzstan is as strange as the sound of its name. For one thing, it's the only nation in the world to host military bases for both the U.S. and Russia. And while it sought - and eventually won - a nearly fourfold rent increase from the Pentagon last year for continued American use of the Manas air base, outside the capital, Bishkek, there was another condition: that the U.S. military stop calling it a base. The U.S. agreed, and so since last summer the busy hub has been officially known as the Transit Center at Manas - a Greyhound bus terminal...
...Russia's influence is extensive in the former Soviet republic, and Moscow has been irritated by the U.S. presence in what it calls its "near abroad" - former Soviet territories - since the U.S. began operations at Manas in 2001. In Moscow in February 2009, perhaps spurred by the offer of a $2 billion loan from Russia, Bakiyev publicly complained that the U.S. wasn't paying enough for its use of the base. That same month, the Kyrgyz parliament voted to end the U.S. presence, though ultimately the lease was renewed with the hefty rent increase. (Read a brief history of Kyrgyzstan...
...Bieniawski's job to convince countries to give up their HEU and send it to either the U.S. or Russia. So far, the NNSA has removed a total of 5,935 lbs. (2,692 kg) of fissile material from 37 countries and has its sights on 4,190 lbs. (1,900 kg) more. To meet that goal, Obama has asked for the program's budget to be increased by 67% percent to $560 million next year. But many countries see HEU-fueled research reactors as symbols of prestige and don't necessarily share U.S. and Russian concern that fissile material...
...President Kermanbek Baikyev fled the capital Bishkek on Wednesday to rally support in his home region of Jalalabad. Bakiyev, who came into office in 2005 as a champion of democracy and reform, has been accused of corruption and rigging elections last year. Foreign observers also see the hand of Russia in recent events - with Moscow eager to reassert its traditional influence over a former Soviet republic that happens to house a key U.S. air base. (Did Moscow subvert Kyrgyzstan, a U.S. ally...
...business monopolies owned by friends and family and cracked down on journalists who pried into allegations of corruption - all the while, Kyrgyzstan's economy floundered, its Soviet-era industry and agriculture withering away while tens of thousands quit the country for low-paying jobs in resource-rich Kazakhstan or Russia. In February 2005, after a round of allegedly rigged elections, popular sentiment boiled over and precipitated mass protests the following month dubbed the "Tulip Revolution" that saw Akayev step down and leave for exile in Moscow...