Cotton picking machines at work in this luxurious expanse o

ow backward Uzbekistan

cae 9 é sige an ay 3

f cotton are typical of the new look of the former “Hungry Steppe.”

aa

came into 20th Century

oo Most interesting thing
Repub; Out the Central Asian
is 4. 8 Of the Soviet Union

3 e Wa :
tig y the national ques-
" Was tackled there. 2

ay saa it was for me dur-

corre Cent visit with a group
during fe nents to Uzbekistan
ard th S 40th anniversary tow-

‘Ay © end of last year.
Revie time of the “Russian
tion in 1917 this area

bee, JW as Turkestan. It had
by Coq tuered ane colonized
F geet Russia in the 1870’s.
regarded as historically
broughe sive step since it
Wit aa area into contact
dustriay cc. and in-

» SYeV,
wyed ritheless, the people en-
€

: little of these benefits and
bY the ept in double bondage
and tsar’s governors-general
tinued Various Emirs who con-
me 0 exercise power.
the * to the tsarist conquest
also ¢ °ples of the region had
ness po extreme backward-
0 Overty for: thousands
dergoen® Central Asia had-un-
tating b Successive conquests
Cedon ack to Alexander of Ma-
by Atay lowed by invasions
Siang 3 8, Ghengis Khan, Per-
Came nd others. The area be-
4 confusion of national-

On Noy.

mmere 12,1917 the Soviet

t addressed a mes-
2 All the Toiling Masses
Stateg. * @nd the East.” It

Yous SMeeforth your faith and
Cultural os your national and
laimeg ,. stitutions are proc-
Orde, .° be free and inviolable.
ang feet National life freely
Tight. restrictedly. It is your
like the NOW that your rights,
of Rus 1ghts of all the nations
the whe’ are safeguarded by
von ele ent of the Revolu-
0 S organs... . (but
fg ourself must be the en
Selg |, YOUr country. You your-
Your BF eaeuee your lives in
4 ay.”

This was no easy task for
the Turkestan peoples. Upris-
ings had taken place at the
time of the 1917 Revolution in
Russia and in April, 1918 the
Soviet of Workers’, Peasants’
and Soldiers’ Deputies proc-
laimed the Turkestan Auto-

By
WILLIAM
DEVINE

Tribune
Staff

Correspondent,
MOSCOW

nomous Soviet Socialist Re-
public incorporated in the Rus-
sian Federation.

But the khanates of Bukhara
and Khiva remained under the
rule of their Emirs and fierce
struggle against them con-
tinued.

Lenin further elaborated the
elements his national policy in
1919. He said:

“Can we approach these
peoples (of Central Asia) and
say: ‘We shall overthrow your
exploiters?? We cannot do this
because they are entirely sub-
ordinated to their mullahs. In
such cases we have to wait
until the given nation develops,
until the differentiation of the
proletariat from the bourgeois
elements, which is inevitable,
has taken place.”

February, 1920 saw the fall
of the Khanate in Khiva, fol-
lowed by the overthrow of the
Emir of Bukhara
tumn of the same year.

in the au- _

The Turkestan Republic and
the Khorezm (Khiva) and Bu-
khara People’s Soviet Repub-
lics were formed within their
traditional boundaries as mul-
tinational states. As the poli-
tical, economic and cultural
development of the territory

proceeded, there arose the pre-
requisites for a national de-
marcation of Central Asia.

In September, 1924, the cen-
tral executives of the three
republics passed the resolutions
forming the republics of Uz-
bekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajik-
istan and Kirghizia. The follow-
ing year Uzbekistan (with simi-
jar steps taken by the other
Central Asian Republics) asked
for and was granted entry into
the Soviet Union.

Today Uzbekistan, as are all
the other 14 Union Republics of
the Soviet Union, is guaranteed
by the constitution the right of
self-determination, up to and in-
cluding the right of secession.

Within Uzbekistan is the Au-
tonomous Republic of Karakal-
pakia — a further example of
how national rights are guaran-
teed to the peoples of Central
Asia. First it had joined the
Russian Federation but in 1936
it joined the Uzbek SSR.

But the Leninist national
policy (I was to hear that policy
praised everywhere I went in
Uzbekistan) had another side:
the great amount of assistance
— grain, machinery, technicians
and educators—rendered by the
Russian people.

Tamerlaine’s
tomb in the
ancient city of
Samarkand,
Uzbekistan, is
an example of
the beautiful
and unusual
architecture
which has been
preserved for
centuries.

As a result Uzbekistan has
developed into an advanced
socialist republic with a viable
economy of its own — frqm a
feudal economy before 1917 to
an industrial - agricultural eco-
nomy today, bypassing the ca-
pitalist stage of development.

A few statistics give an idea
of the scope of development.

Before the 1917 Revolution
Uzbekistan had to import even
nails. Now the republic has 100
different types of industry and
no fewer than 1,200 individual
enterprises. It exports goods to
58 countries.

As to agriculture, the produc-
tion of cotton — the republic’s
mainstay — has increased 6.8
times since 1917. Agriculture is
fully mechanized.

The most striking evidence
of agricultural advance I saw
was the transformation of the
Hungry Steppe. This is a vast
area of some 2)4, million acres.

Before the Revolution only
about 80,000 acres were cultiv-
ated. The rest was dry, barren
scrubland.

Now, through a network of
irrigation canals from the Sur-
Darya River a third of it is
under cultivation to cotton and
by 1980 the entire area will be
cultivated.

At the same time, cultivation
of the Hungry Steppe has
brought into being new towns
and cities which are becoming
industrial centres for the ‘pro-
duction of materials needed in
the work of irrigation.

Cultural and living -standards
have kept pace with all this ad-
vance. Illiteracy has been wiped
out, medical treatment is avail- -
able to all and a professional

“theatre now flourishes. During

the current seven-year plan the ~
real wages of workers will rise
40 percent, those of collective
farmers, 50 percent.

Mammoth strides in housing
construction have been taken—
eight million square metres
built in the last five years.
There are still many of the old,
adobe-type huts to be seen, but
their occupants are being rapid-
“ly re-housed in new apartment
developments.

* * *

A Canadian, thinking about
Uzbekistan’s free and equal par-
ticipation in the socialist family
of nations that make up the
USSR, could be pardoned if his
first impulse is to seek compar-
isons between that situation
and the present constitutional
crisis involving the two nations
of French and English-speaking
Canada, or even to recall the
plight of Canada’s Indians.

Comparisons should never be
too hasty. But Canadians who-
are concerned about these prob-
lems might do well to ponder
how the solution to the national
question was undertaken in the
Soviet Union. :

April 2, 1965—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 7