Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Saturday urged Kyrgyzstan's interim leaders to end political uncertainty, saying Moscow was considering more aid for the embattled Central Asian state.
Kyrgyzstan has been in crisis since a popular uprising in April ousted president Kurmanbek Bakiyev and left dozens of people dead.
Putin moved swiftly to recognise the new interim authorities and offered aid to the former Soviet nation days before the West formulated a coherent response.
Speaking in an interview with the Mir television channel, Putin called the situation in the country "complicated and ambiguous."
"Sometimes we don't fully understand the internal processes," he said. "We'd want very much for this period of uncertainty to end as soon as possible."
Ethnic violence flared up again this week and secret audio recordings surfaced Friday that implicated Kyrgyzstan's interim rulers in a one-million-dollar fraud scandal.
Kyrgyzstan's new leaders have denied its top officials sought to embezzle funds.
Putin said Russia could soon send more aid to the country, where Moscow and Washington both maintain military bases.
"We have made a decision to render humanitarian assistance to Kyrgyzstan: in the form of money, oil products and grain," Putin said in the interview with Mir television, which is run by members of the Commonwealth of Independent States, a grouping of ex-Soviet nations.
"Now we are considering an issue of extending and increasing the volume of this aid."
Putin also urged the nation's interim authorities to conduct elections in the near future.
"We are also interested in the legitimacy of the acting authorities to be confirmed by the usual procedures that are universally recognized in the world," Putin said in comments released by his government Saturday.
"I know that the current Kyrgyz authorities are preparing for these elections. We welcome this in every way possible and support dialogue."
In the latest attempt to assert its control over the unruly ex-Soviet state, the interim government this week scrapped presidential polls planned for October and decreed its head Roza Otunbayeva as president until December 31, 2011.
Parliament elections are still scheduled for October.
Analysts say Putin supports the interim leaders out of revenge for what he considers a humiliation suffered by Russia when Bakiyev let a US military base remain in Kyrgyzstan after publicly announcing it would be closed.
That announcement was made after Russia promised Bakiyev two billion dollars in aid and loans.
Source: AFP Global Edition
