Russia holds off on sending troops to Kyrgyzstan

The Kremlin has said it would not immediately send Russian troops to Kyrgyzstan after the country asked Moscow for military assistance to help quell ethnic violence.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s spokeswoman Natalya Timakova said today that Russia would offer humanitarian assistance and help evacuate those wounded in rampages that swept Kyrgyzstan’s second-largest city of Osh.

But she said that Russia would not immediately send its own troops to Kyrgyzstan, because it does not see conditions for intervening to settle its internal conflict.

Ms Timakova said that Russia would conduct consultations on Monday with other nation members of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation on the possibility of sending its peacekeepers to Kyrgyzstan.