BISHKEK - Kyrgyzstan's parliament ended days of uncertainty on Monday by accepting ousted president Askar Akayev's resignation and setting July 10 as the date for presidential elections.
The Central Asian country's parliament approved Akayev's resignation by 48 votes to five and then set a fresh date for polls that had earlier been scheduled for late June.
The setting of an election date later than that previously planned was designed to create a more level playing field for potential candidates, parliament speaker Omurbek Tekebayev said.
"We changed the election date so that all candidates have time to prepare -- not only Bakiyev, who is currently using all resources of the administration," Tekebayev told journalists, referring to the country's new prime minister and acting president, Kurmanbek Bakiyev.
Akayev fled this former Soviet republic that he had led since 1990 on March 24 when weeks of unrest over a disputed parliamentary poll boiled over and opposition protestors overran the main seat of government in the capital Bishkek.
On Friday parliament stripped Akayev of many privileges that he would previously have been due and stripped his relatives of immunity from prosecution that they had previously been granted.
Elsewhere in the capital Bishkek on Monday the supreme court resolved another major element of uncertainty hanging over the country, annulling a criminal conviction against Felix Kulov, a leading politician seen as a likely election rival to Bakiyev.
Kulov, a popular former head of national security and Bishkek mayor, was jailed for seven years in 2000 on corruption charges widely seen as politically driven.
He was freed from jail immediately after Akayev's ouster and was entrusted by Bakiyev with the task of restoring law and order amid a massive wave of looting that hit the capital.
Kulov reacted with satisfaction to Monday's supreme court decision annulling the last of two criminal convictions against him, but remained coy about his intentions.
"Finally the court has been able to objectively and fairly consider my two criminal cases -- it shows that democratic changes have indeed occurred," Kulov said.
"I have not yet made a final decision whether or not to run for the presidency as it is too heavy a responsibility -- I will now closely work with my party Ar-Namys (Dignity) and prepare for the party's congress," Kulov told journalists.
Monday's key decisions will come as a relief after Western diplomats and Kyrgyz politicians had warned that the situation appeared to again be spinning out of control in this mountain republic on China's western edge.
In recent days thousands of impoverished country dwellers have taken to seizing land around the capital, while supporters of a disaffected election candidate have taken over a regional governor's headquarters and threatened to march on Bishkek.
The instability continued over the weekend with the shooting dead on Sunday night of a leading figure in Bakiyev's People's Movement, Usen Kudaibergenov, who was killed in his home by unknown assailants.
He had been a leading figure in the "people's militia" tasked with restoring order after Akayev's ouster and had demonstrated against those seizing land around Bishkek's periphery in recent days, Kyrgyz media said.
04/11/2005 08:33 GMT