Kant, a small Kyrgyz town of 21,000, lies 20 km east of the capital, Bishkek. Its name means “sugar” in Kyrgyz, after a sugar factory set up here in the 1930s. But that factory has long since closed, and life here is hardly sweet. It’s a typically soulless post-Soviet town: five-story Khrushchev-era apartment blocks, grim factories, […]