Good news for the GOP....another country in chaos to which we can invade and bring democracy. Oh wait, Uzbekistan, is one of Bush's allies. For a man who claims to be bringing democracy to the world, he sure has a lot of dicatators and would be dictators as friends. Why do you think that is, stevo?
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Hundreds said killed by military in Uzbekistan insurgency
By Yossi Melman, Haaretz Correspondent and The Associated Press
Diplomatic sources in Uzbekistan said Saturday that the military has killed hundreds of people in its attempts to quell an insurgency in the the eastern city of Andijan.
Israel's ambassador to Uzbekistan, Ami Mehl, told Haaretz that there haven't been any Israelis or Jews casualties in the day's violence.
Mehl also said that Friday's foiled attack against the Israeli embassy in the capital, Taskkent, was not linked to the latest insurgency.
President Islam Karimov claimed, however, that authorities tried to negotiate a peaceful end to protests, but that troops were forced to open fire when insurgents who had seized a government building attempted to break through an advancing line of Uzbek police and soldiers.
He said 10 government troops and "many more" militants died in fighting Friday in Andijan. Relatives of the victims condemned the government, accusing troops of killing innocent civilians. Witnesses said 200 to 300 people were shot dead.
Soldiers loyal to Karimov, who has maintained tight control over this Central Asian nation, fired on thousands of demonstrators Friday to put down an uprising that began when armed men freed 2,000 inmates from prison, including suspects on trial for alleged Islamic extremism. The U.S. State Department expressed concern on Friday that members of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, which is on the U.S. list of terrorist groups, were freed.
Karimov said at least 100 people were wounded in the Friday clashes. He didn't specify who fired first.
Hundreds of angry protesters gathered Saturday at the site of the violence, placing six bodies on display from among the scores of people witnesses said were killed in fighting. Knots of bystanders watched as men covered other bloodied bodies with white shrouds.
Demonstrators, some with tears in their eyes, condemned the government for firing on women and children.
Fleeing the violence, some 6,000 Uzbek residents headed Saturday to the border. Kyrgyz border guards were awaiting a government decision on whether to allow them in, said Gulmira Borubayeva, a spokeswoman for Kyrgyzstan's border guard service.
Karimov said Saturday that authorities tried to negotiate a peaceful way out - but won't yield to the protesters' demand - which he described as excessive - for freedom for all their followers across the Fergana Valley.
"To accept their terms would mean that we are setting a precedent that no other country in the world would accept," Karimov told a news conference in Tashkent.
The Uzbek leader denied that forces would target innocent civilians. "In Uzbekistan, nobody fights against women, children or the elderly," Karimov said.
He also claimed the government also earlier offered the demonstrators free passage out of the city in buses - with their weapons, seized in attacks on a police station and military outpost.
But a protest leader, Kabuljon Parpiyev, said Interior Minister Zakir Almatov didn't sound willing to negotiate in a phone call Friday. "He said, 'We don't care if 200, 300 or 400 people die. We have force and we will chuck you out of there anyway,"' Parpiyev quoted Almatov as saying.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and Karimov spoke by telephone on Saturday, the Kremlin said.
"Both sides expressed concern about the danger of the destabilization of the situation in the Central Asian region," the Kremlin press service said in a statement.
In Washington, the White House urged restraint by both sides. "The people of Uzbekistan want to see a more representative and democratic government. But that should come through peaceful means, not through violence," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Friday.
No government forces were at the square early Saturday, but a few blocks away, about 30 soldiers clad in flak jackets and armed with assault rifles stood ready for action.
Big military trucks loaded with soldiers cruised the streets and troops backed by armored vehicles surrounded heavily fortified local police headquarters in the city.
Earlier Saturday, soldiers loaded scores of bodies onto four trucks and a bus after blocking friends and relatives from collecting them, witnesses said.
Lutfulo Shamsutdinov, head of the Independent Human Rights Organization of Uzbekistan, said he saw the bodies of about 200 victims being loaded onto trucks near the square.
A witness in central Andijan told The Associated Press that "many, many dead bodies are stacked up by a school near the square."
An AP reporter saw at least 30 bodies. All had been shot, and at least one had his skull smashed. The streets were stained with blood and littered with spent cartridges.
Daniyar Akbarov, 24, joined the protests Saturday after being freed from the prison during the earlier clashes.
"Our women and children are dying," he said, tearfully beating his chest with his fists. Akbarov said he saw at least 300 people killed.
The focus of the jailbreak was 23 men charged with membership in a group allegedly allied with the outlawed radical Islamic party Hizb-ut-Tahrir, which seeks to create a worldwide Islamic state and has been forced underground throughout most of Central Asia and Russia.
Supporters of the 23 men say they were victims of religious repression by Karimov's secular government.
The men are alleged members of Akramia - a group named for their founder, Akram Yuldashev, an Islamic dissident sentenced in 1999 to 17 years in prison for allegedly urging the overthrow of Karimov. He has proclaimed his innocence.
Akramis are considered the backbone of Andijan's small business community, running a medical clinic and pharmacy, as well as working as furniture craftsmen, and providing employment to thousands in the impoverished Fergana Valley, where Islamist sentiment runs high.
Their trial has inspired one of the largest public shows of anger at the government. In recent weeks, Uzbeks have shown increasing willingness to challenge the leadership in protests, apparently bolstered by the March uprising in Kyrgyzstan that drove out President Askar Akayev and the similar ones in Ukraine and Georgia.
Karimov said people from Kyrgyzstan were among the organizers of the violence in Andijan, and claimed they were trying to repeat the events from the neighboring country in Uzbekistan.
Almambet Matubraimov, acting President Kurmanbek Bakiyev's representative in southern Kyrgyzstan, vehemently denied the accusation.
"It's not true that Kyrgyz citizens were involved in the events in Andijan. Our people have nothing to do with it. Kyrgyzstan has had nothing to do with it," he said
haaretz.com |
