It’s a trip Steve Swerdlow has made many times: from Los Angeles, California, to Istanbul, Turkey, then to Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. Kyrgyzstan is a country that Swerdlow knows well and loves deeply. He lived in Bishkek from 2012 to 2019 while working for Human Rights Watch and completely immersed himself in the rhythms of the city – literally, Swerdlow is a jazz pianist and performs regularly while living in Kyrgyzstan. He continued to visit her in the years that followed, after taking a professorship at the University of Southern California (USC).
On May 19, it was in this role – as professor, but also tour guide and translator – that Swerdlow landed once again at Manas International Airport, north of Bishkek, accompanied by 16 USC undergraduates.
His students lined up behind him in the passport queue and then, around 4:30 a.m., everything went wrong.
Almost immediately, Swerdlow told the Diplomat, he was taken out of the queue and taken to a small office in the departures area on the second floor of the airport. There, three border officials – “almost gleefully” – told him that he was banned from entering Kyrgyzstan.
When asked for an explanation, the officers turned around, telling Swerdlow that they were only the “enforcers” and had no information about why he was being denied entry. Several different officers said he would receive a formal, written eviction order stating the reason for his refusal, as required by law.
The only clue he was given was a comment from one of the officers that he had been placed on the banned list in 2024. That year, Swerdlow had led a similar group of students to Kyrgyzstan without incident.
Swerdlow told The Diplomat that this trip has been in the works for more than a year, following two others in 2022 and 2024 during USC’s “Maymester.” Maymester programs allow students who otherwise would not be able to complete a full summer study abroad program to travel and experience the world for themselves.
Unfortunately, Swerdlow’s 16 students have a front row seat in Kyrgyzstan. transformation of the region’s first democracy into just another autocracy in Central Asiawhere the rule of law is applied arbitrarily.
Only later, after they were escorted onto a Turkish Airlines flight and returned to Istanbul, did Turkish authorities return Swerdlow’s passport and show him the official expulsion letter.
Photo provided by Steve Swerdlow.
He was not allowed to keep it – even though it contained a lot of useful information. In the field titled “Reason,” only four words were printed in Russian: “Entry to the Kyrgyz Republic is closed.” Swerdlow was allowed to take a photo of the document.
Swerdlow’s students, left behind in the passport queue, eventually entered Kyrgyzstan and were greeted by staff from the American University of Central Asia, with whom Swerdlow planned part of the trip. They attended a few meetings – including with the British ambassador to Kyrgyzstan – but Swerdlow wasn’t sure, when he spoke with The Diplomat, how much of the planned route would actually play out now.
The agenda included meetings with policymakers, government officials, NGO activists, journalists, academics, etc., as well as a stay in a yurt near the iconic Issyk-Kul to include recitations of Manas, cooking classes and Kok-Boru. Swerdlow even organized a jazz show for May 26.
Swerdlow spoke to The Diplomat by phone from Istanbul, while waiting for a flight to Almaty, Kazakhstan, where he hopes to reunite with his students.
As of publication, the U.S. Embassy in Bishkek and the U.S. State Department have not made any public statements regarding Swerdlow’s ordeal.
U.S. citizens technically have visa-free access to Kyrgyzstan for stays of up to 30 days; Kyrgyz citizens, meanwhile, are subject to extraordinary scrutiny when obtaining visas to visit the United States, including a new requirement to pay a deposit of up to $15,000 to obtain a visa.
Kyrgyzstan has not revoked its visa-waiver policy for Americans, and Swerdlow has yet to receive an official explanation for his expulsion.
Over the years, Kyrgyzstan has periodically barred access to human rights activists and foreign journalists, usually without notice and rarely with a clear explanation. Human Rights Watch Mihra Rittmann was declared persona non grata and banned in 2015 and British journalist Chris Rickelton was refused entry in 2017. In 2021, there were discussions that Bishkek was reviewing its bans on both, but that chatter fell into silence as Kyrgyzstan’s human rights situation deteriorated further.