VISA REGIMES AND REGULATORY DOCUMENTS AS AN OBSTACLE FOR TOURISM DEVELOPMENT IN CENTRAL ASIA - Tourism in Central Asia: Cultural Potential and Challenges - page 240

thorities. To the contrary: the number of exceptions and the ambiguity of
the rules has been an invitation for attempts to force bribes. The author
of this article has experienced a number of passport controls and luggage
checks during his stay in Kyrgyzstan, particularly in Bishkek in 1999-
2003. In spite of advisories of the visa-free relationship and registration
in our passports, we were subjected to interrogations on several occasions
and verification of the visa-free relationship. This was done in order to ob-
tain a bribe (“We won't make any problems for you regarding visas if you
share with us in a brotherly way,” that is, give us “something”).
Tourists from CIS countries should theoretically be in the most advan-
tageous position in terms of visa policy (including those from Georgia,
which recently exited the organization). Most CIS countries have mutu-
ally recognized visa-free relationships based upon treaties. 7 This makes it
much easier for CIS citizens to move within the visa-free zone. However,
the embassies of the CIS states' failure to protect their own citizens makes
the border guards and militiamen prefer to extract bribes from the much
more vulnerable former citizens of the USSR. Citizens of developed coun-
tries may call upon their own consuls for assistance if problems should
arise (EU citizens have recourse to the authorities of any Member State
of the Union), but those of CIS countries may not be allowed to do so by
local authorities because the laxity of consular staff from these countries
is well known.
A significant shift in visa-free regimes between states of the former
USSR arose when travel between selected states became possible using just
internal passports or internal identification cards. In Central Asia, this op-
tion is available for travel between citizens of Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan,
as well as between citizens of Kazakhstan, Russia and Belarus (as parts of
the Custom Union). The measure had already been in effect regarding
Russia before introduction of this treaty.
By contrast, since 1999 Turkmenistan has withdrawn from joint trea-
ties and introduced visa requirements for all CIS citizens without excep-
tion, slightly easing visa requirements only for border areas along the
Uzbekistan border. After the invasion of armed groups belonging to the
Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan in Central Asia, Uzbekistan introduced
visa requirements for citizens of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, with lesser
7 Soglasheniie o bezvizovom peredvizhenii grazhdan gosudarstv Sodruzhestva Nezavisimykh
Gosudarstv po territorii ego uchastnikov ot 9 oktiabria 1992 g.