WASHINGTON, Oct 9: US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will this week refrain from pressing Central Asian governments for speedy democratic change out of fear of alienating military dictators in an unstable but oil-rich region.

Rice will make her first trip as the top US diplomat to Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan, where pro-democracy rhetoric sends shivers through the hard-line governments after ousters in recent years of autocrats in other ex-Soviet states.

Washington vowed this year to make democracy-building central to bilateral relations, but if it presses too hard in Central Asia it risks losing influence to Russia and China, which make no such demands, according to political analysts.

At stake is sway over a region that is a narcotics crossroads, a vital launching pad for the US campaign against the Taliban in Afghanistan, and home to some of the world’s largest oil finds in recent decades.

The State Department’s top diplomat for the region, Daniel Fried, defended Rice’s planned caution saying the United States was realistic about how quickly it could prompt change and has decided not to criticize every anti-democratic move it sees.

The governments have also told the United States to “lay off” prodding them on democracy, he said.

“The art of diplomacy and foreign policymaking is taking your principles, sticking to them, but applying them in the real world in ways that make sense,” he told reporters in a preview of a trip that will also include Afghanistan, and possibly France and Britain.

“That’s easy to say and it’s very hard to do. You have to be realistic enough to distinguish between what you want in the end and what you see on the ground as possible in any given year and on any given day,” he said, adding that US military, economic and democracy interests were indivisible.

The State Department has been vocal this year in other regions, insisting Latin American leaders govern democratically and prodding Arab allies to open their political systems.

But it has been largely mute on Central Asia.

Last week, a day after Rice’s trip was announced, an opposition leader was jailed in Tajikistan, in a move that eliminated from next year’s elections a top rival to the long-standing leader Imomali Rakhmonov.

The State Department has refused to condemn the move in a country that allows Washington to fly missions through its airspace into Afghanistan.

And when the United States has spoken out, it has paid a price.

After troops in Uzbekistan massacred protesters this year, Washington — albeit less forcefully than other Western powers — called for an inquiry.

In response, President Islam Karimov ejected the United States from an air base used against the Taliban.

Fried flew to Uzbekistan for talks on the base and Karimov “all but slammed the door in his face,” according to a State Department official briefed on the meeting.

Unlikely to achieve much with Karimov, Rice has omitted Uzbekistan from her schedule, Fried said.

Robert Templer, of the International Crisis Group, whose goal is to prevent conflicts worldwide, said the United States has a “half-hearted commitment to democracy” in Central Asia to protect its ties with governments that are weak and paranoid Washington wants their ouster.

But Kimberly Marten, a political science professor at Barnard College, Columbia University, said too much pressure for full democracies would be counterproductive and further destabilize a region.—Reuters