Moscow has been recently been courting its former Soviet satellites in the region in an attempt to counter what it perceives as a growing US military presence in its traditional geo-strategic backyard.

But that effort ran into trouble last week when Uzbekistan, Central Asia's most populous state, lashed out at plans by a Russia-dominated regional security organisation for a new base near its volatile border with Kyrgyzstan.

Uzbekistan blasted the deal, signed last month between Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his Kyrgyz counterpart Kurmanbek Bakiyev, saying it would destabilise the region, embolden extremists and lead to a military buildup.

In reality Uzbekistan, which has pursued warmer ties with Washington, fears Russia could use the base in southern Kyrgyzstan to tip the regional balance of power against it, said Alexander Cooley, a political scientist at Columbia University in New York.

"Russia's renewed assertiveness in the region is troubling for Tashkent, which considers itself the dominant power in southern Central Asia and fears that Moscow may support rival Central Asian states against it," he said.

"Uzbekistan feels threatened by the decision ... as it could be used by Moscow in the future to support Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan's regional rival, in water management issues and other local disputes."

The US military first set up a base in Uzbekistan to support operations launched in Afghanistan immediately following the September 11, 2001 attacks, a presence that initially had the Kremlin's blessing.

That blessing however gradually turned to suspicion when the US presence in Uzbekistan lingered years after US-led forces ousted Afghanistan's Taliban regime -- Washington's stated purpose for creating the base in the first place.

In 2002, Russia founded the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO), a loose grouping of ex-Soviet states with ostensibly shared security concerns, in part to offset the new US military presence in Central Asia.

Tashkent hosted the US base until 2006, when it evicted the Americans following scathing Western criticism of a bloody 2005 government crackdown on protestors in the Uzbek city of Andijan.

Moscow by contrast made no demands then on Uzbekistan's human rights record, considered one of the most abysmal in the world, and in turn won a valuable regional ally following Tashkent's abrupt shutdown of the US base.

Lately however relations between Washington and Tashkent have thawed, notably since the inauguration of US President Barack Obama, whose administration is less vocal about human rights abuses in the region than that of his predecessor.

In April, the United States signed a deal with Uzbekistan to allow non-military materiel to transit the country en route for Afghanistan, after Kyrgyzstan declared it also intended to evict a US airbase from its territory.

This new deal with Washington could be one reason why Uzbek President Islam Karimov appears to feel more confident in standing up to the Kremlin, said Paul Quinn-Judge, a Bishkek-based analyst for the International Crisis Group.

"It's quite clear that the Americans are moving into Uzbekistan, for re-supply purposes at least, for the longer haul," Quinn-Judge said.

Referring to Karimov, he said this new US presence "must give him the sense that he's got a patron around who's going to be there for some time and be a counterbalance to the Russians."

Moscow appears to have been taken aback by the level of Uzbek opposition to its new base plan and has already begun publicly to backpedal, perhaps fearful that Uzbekistan could pull out of the CSTO altogether.

"On the current day there is no location, no number and, most importantly, no agreement about the placement of the base," CSTO Secretary General Nikolai Bordyuzha told Russian news agency Interfax last week.

What implications the standoff could have for Russian interests in Central Asia may depend on how far Uzbekistan is prepared to push, said Sarah Michaels, senior editor for the ex-Soviet Union at Oxford Analytica, a Britain-based think tank.

Uzbekistan "is not coming from a position of confidence but rather from a position of insecurity and concern about what exactly Russia will be doing with that base," she said.

"I wouldn't be surprised if they do pull out of the CSTO. It really depends on how Russia responds to Uzbekistan lashing out at the apparent establishment of the base."

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