Red Cross: 'several hundred' dead in Kyrgyz unrest

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Red Cross: 'several hundred' dead in Kyrgyz unrest

By YURAS KARMANAU and SERGEI GRITS (AP) – 58 minutes ago

OSH, Kyrgyzstan — Several hundred people have been killed in the riots in

Kyrgyzstan, the Red Cross said Tuesday, as new reports strengthened suspicions

that the violence was deliberately ignited to undermine the Central Asian

nation's interim government.

The southern part of Kyrgyzstan has been convulsed by days of rioting targeting

minority Uzbeks, which has left the country's second-largest city, Osh, in

smoldering ruins and sent over 100,000 Uzbeks fleeing for their lives to

neighboring Uzbekistan.

Overwhelmed by the deluge, Uzbekistan closed the border Tuesday, leaving

thousands camped out on the Kyrgyz side or stranded behind barbed-wire fences in

no-man's land.

As the United States, Russia and the United Nations flew in humanitarian

supplies, the leader of country's interim government pressed Moscow again to

send in troops to quell the violence.

The International Committee of the Red Cross had no precise figure of the dead,

but spokesman Christian Cardon said " we are talking about several hundreds. "

Kyrgyzstan's interim President Roza Otunbayeva also acknowledged Tuesday the

real death toll likely was " several times higher " than official count of 179

people killed, because many victims were buried by their relatives the same day

in keeping with the Muslim tradition. Nearly 1,900 have been were injured, the

Health Ministry said.

Otunbayeva said she also talked again with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev

about sending in troops, a move Moscow had refused over the weekend. Both the

U.S. and Moscow have air bases in the strategically located nation, but they are

in the north, far from the rioting.

Otunbayeva's government, which took over when former President Kurmanbek Bakiyev

was ousted in an April uprising, has accused Bakiyev's family of instigating the

violence to halt a June 27 referendum on a new constitution. Ethnic Uzbeks have

mostly backed the interim government, while many Kyrgyz in the south have

supported Bakiyev.

From self-imposed exile in Belarus, Bakiyev has denied any ties to the violence,

but Otunbayeva insisted Tuesday that his supporters had stoked the conflict.

" Many instigators have been detained and they are giving evidence on Bakiyev's

involvement in the events. No one has doubts that he is involved, " she said.

Rupert Colville, spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, told

reporters in Geneva there was evidence the violence was coordinated and began

with five simultaneous attacks in Osh by men wearing ski masks. U.N. High

Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay also said the fighting " appears to be

orchestrated, targeted and well-planned " and urged authorities to act before it

spread further.

Militants from neighboring Tajikistan drove around Osh in vehicles with tinted

windows shooting both Uzbeks and Kyrgyz last week to spark the violence, Kyrgyz

deputy security chief Kubat Baibolov said.

" They were employed by people close to the Bakiyev family who have been expelled

from power, " Baibolov said. He gave no further details, but added that some of

the Tajik militants had been detained and testified about their role in the

unrest.

The government said earlier that suspects from Tajikistan, Afghanistan and

Kyrgyzstan were detained and told authorities they were hired by Bakiyev

supporters to start the rioting.

Bakiyev's younger son, Maxim, was arrested Monday in Britain, Kyrgyz security

chief Kenishbek Duishebayev said. Prosecutors allege that companies Maxim

Bakiyev owned avoided almost $80 million in taxes on aviation fuel sold to

suppliers of the U.S. air base near the capital of Bishkek.

Bakiyev's regime faced widespread allegations of corruption and his family

members grew wealthy and power while he was president from 2005 to April this

year.

The region around Osh is also known as a key hub for drugs flowing out of

Afghanistan, and thus a hotbed for gangs and guns.

The United Nations and the European Union, meanwhile, urged Kyrgyzstan not to

let the violence derail a June 27 constitutional referendum and parliamentary

elections scheduled for October.

" The referendum and the elections must be held at the announced times " so

Kyrgyzstan moves further toward democracy, U.N. representative Miroslav Jenca

said in the capital, Bishkek. The EU backs this position, according to Germany's

ambassador to Kyrgyzstan, Holger Green.

Yet the scale of the damage was so vast in the south it was hard to see how a

legitimate vote could be held in less than two weeks. Up to 200,000 people have

fled violence within Kyrgyzstan just since Thursday, UN refugee agency spokesman

Andrej Mahecic said in Geneva.

An AP photographer in the southern town of Nariman, near Osh, saw 10 buses and

trucks filled with Uzbek refugees heading toward the border Tuesday in just 10

minutes.

At a Nariman hospital, dozens of wounded Uzbeks lay in corridors and broken

beds. Many at the hospital, which lacked medical supplies, claimed the rampages

had been premeditated.

" Well-armed people who were obviously well prepared for this conflict were

shooting at us, " said Teymurat Yuldashev, 26, who had bullet wounds in his arm

and chest of different caliber. " They were organized, with weapons, militants

and snipers. They simply destroyed us. "

Deadly rampages in the country's south began late Thursday, as mobs of ethnic

Kyrgyz torched homes and businesses of ethnic Uzbeks. Many sections of Osh, a

city of 250,000, were burned to the ground and the rampages spread into

surrounding towns and villages.

Tens of thousands of Uzbeks are now in 30 different refugee camps in Uzbekistan,

including several camps around the eastern city of Andijan.

Several thousand refugees waited in squalid conditions Tuesday near one border

crossing on the Kyrgyz side near Osh, with more people arriving by the hour.

Heavy rainstorms overnight soaked makeshift tents made from carpets, and the air

resounded with the sounds of crying women and children.

" There is no humanitarian assistance, no water, this is worse than living like

an animal, " said Fedya Okramov, 21, one of 10 family members who had taken

refuge under a tree.

The ICRC said Uzbekistan was overwhelmed by the number of refugees. Earlier,

Uzbekistan had said it had processed over 45,000 refugees, and an Uzbek leader

said over 80,000 had made it across the border. But it was not clear Tuesday

when or if the border would reopen.

Clashes continued in and around Osh on Tuesday. Interior Ministry troops

patrolled Jalal-Abad, a major city about 45 miles (70 kilometers) from Osh, but

city spokeswoman Klaya Tapkeyeva said region was still not safe.

___

Karmanau and Associated Press reporter Leila Saralayeva reported from Bishkek,

Kyrgyzstan. AP reporter Jordans contributed from Geneva.

(This version CORRECTS spelling of security official's name.)

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