Authorities sanctioned the arrest of three of Kulov's associates in the United Front movement Wednesday for organizing riots in the capital, Bishkek, which were dispersed April 19. The opposition members could face up to eight years in jail under local law.
"The only thing that [President Kurmanbek] Bakiyev wants is to isolate me. I propose that they arrest me and release all the others," said Kulov who was himself questioned but not arrested Saturday. "It is better to hold one innocent than many innocents."
The former presidential ally, who resigned amid confrontation between the president and parliament in February, said he would turn himself in Friday to the National Security Committee.
"Let them press all the charges they want against me, the court will nevertheless acquit me," he said, adding that he would not be convicted because it would be compromising for the president to block his opponent at a time of continuing mass protests.
Kulov warned that the arrests of his colleagues could have dangerous consequences. "The situation in these people's home towns is very tense, people are in an aggressive mood," he said. "We will hold many protests by fall, and then there will be the culmination."
He said the United Front had set itself the objective of relieving tensions to prevent irreversible developments in the fall.
A former political prisoner, who came to power together with President Bakiyev on the back of violent mass protests in March 2005, Kulov said last week his main objective was to prevent a split between the country's prosperous north and the poorer south where Bakiyev comes from.
"People say the Bakiyev regime has produced a North-South divide in the country, and I am trying to persuade people that this should not be allowed to happen," Kulov, himself a northerner, said.
United Front accuses Bakiyev of failing to improve living standards, curb corruption and introduce democracy in the impoverished Central Asian republic. The mass protests organized by the opposition demanded the president's resignation and early elections.
