BISHKEK, KYRGYZSTAN—Kyrgyz mobs burned Uzbek homes and cafes and slaughtered Uzbek villagers Sunday in the worst ethnic rioting this Central Asian nation has seen in 20 years. More than 75,000 Uzbeks fled across the border into Uzbekistan, trying to dodge bullets in a frantic dash to safety.
Triumphant crowds of Kyrgyz men took control of Osh, the second-largest city in Kyrgyzstan, on Sunday as the few Uzbeks still left barricaded themselves in their neighbourhoods. Fires set by rioters raged across the city of 250,000, and food was scarce after widespread looting. Police or military troops were nowhere to be seen.
The rioting that begin Thursday night appeared aimed at undermining Kyrgyzstan’s interim government, which came to power after former President Kurmanbek Bakiyev was ousted in a bloody uprising in April and fled the country. Uzbeks have backed the interim government, while many Kyrgyz in the south have support the toppled president.
The United States, Russia, and the U.N. chief all expressed alarm about the scale of the violence and discussed how to help the refugees. Russia sent in an extra battalion to protect its air base in the northern part of the country.
Most of the Uzbek refugees at the border were elderly people, women and children, with the men having remained behind to defend their property. Many arrived with gunshot wounds, the Uzbekistan Emergencies Ministry said, according to Russian media.
“We saw lots of dead. I saw one guy die after being shot in the chest,” said Ziyeda Akhmedova, an Uzbek women in her late 20s at one of several camps hastily set up in Uzbekistan along the border.
Interim President Roza Otunbayeva blamed Bakiyev’s family for instigating the unrest, saying it aimed to derail a June 27 constitutional referendum and new elections scheduled for October. “Bakiyev’s entourage has funded and organized these riots,” Otunbayeva’s deputy Omurbek Tekebayev told The Associated Press.
From his self-imposed exile in Belarus, Bakiyev denied any role in the violence and blamed interim authorities for failing to protect the people.
The interim government ordered troops to shoot rioters dead, but even that failed to stop the spiraling violence that has left more than 100 people dead and over 1,250 wounded. Doctors say the true toll may be much higher because wounded minority Uzbeks are too afraid of being attacked again to go to hospitals.
The rampages spread quickly Sunday to Jalal-Abad, another major southern city 45 miles (70 kilometres) from Osh, and its neighbouring villages, as mobs methodically set Uzbek houses, stores and cafes on fire. The rioters seized an armoured vehicle and automatic weapons at a local military unit and attacked police stations around the region trying to get more firearms.
Police and the military appeared to be on the defensive across the south, avoiding clashes with mobs. Flights to both Osh and Jalal-Abad were cancelled and the airports were closed.
Kyrgyzstan hosts both U.S. and Russian military air bases, but they are in the north, away from the rioting. Russia refused Kyrgyzstan’s request for military help to quell the rioting, but confirmed it sent extra reinforcements Sunday to protect its base.
The U.S. Manas air base in the capital, Bishkek, is a crucial supply hub for the coalition fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan. Manas was working with the U.S. State Department and interim government to help deliver food and medical supplies to the refugees, said Air Force Maj. John A. Elolf, a spokesman at the base.
A Pentagon spokesman said the interim government had not asked for any U.S. military help.
Uzbekistan’s Foreign Ministry condemned the riots and voiced hope that Kyrgyzstan will re-establish order, but the country’s authoritarian President Islam Karimov is unlikely to interfere in the conflict.
In Jalal-Abad on Sunday, thousands of Kyrgyz men brandishing sticks, metals bars and hunting rifles marched together to burn Uzbek property while frightened police stayed away. Uzbeks felled trees on the city’s main street, trying to block their advance.
Kyrgyz mobs tried to storm the city’s hospital, but Uzbeks drove them off after a fierce gunbattle that raged for hours, witnesses said. Mobs also surrounded a local prison, trying to free its inmates and attempted repeatedly to capture the Jalal-Abad police headquarters, but were repelled.
Kyrgyz mobs killed about 30 Uzbeks Sunday in the village of Suzak near Jalal-Abad, Talaaibek Myrzabayev, the chief military conscription officer in Bishkek, told the AP. Another Uzbek village, Dostuk, was burned by Kyrgyz assailants, but it was not known how many people were killed, he said.
Ethnic Uzbeks ambushed about 100 Kyrgyz men Sunday on a road near Jalal-Abad and took them hostage, he said. Vehicles on the main highway near Jalal-Abad repeatedly came under fire from unidentified gunmen. Later in the day, troops were seen shooting at the gunmen.
In the nearby village of Bazar-Kurgan, 400 Uzbeks overturned cars and killed a police captain, local resident Asyl Tekebayev said. Residents said armed Kyrgyz men were flooding into the village to retaliate.
The fertile Ferghana Valley where Osh and Jalal-Abad are located once belonged to a single feudal lord, but it was split by Soviet dictator Josef Stalin among Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. The Stalinist borders rekindled old rivalries and fomented ethnic tensions.
Both ethnic groups are predominantly Sunni Muslim. Uzbeks are generally better off economically, but they have few representatives in power and have pushed for broader political and cultural rights. While Uzbeks make up only about 15 per cent of the overall population, they rival Kyrgyz in numbers in the Osh and Jalal-Abad regions.
In 1990, hundreds were killed in a violent land dispute between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in Osh, and only the quick deployment of Soviet troops quelled the fighting. With no Russian troops in sight, the interim government announced a partial mobilization of military reservists up to 50 years old.
“No one is rushing to help us, so we need to establish order ourselves,” said Talaaibek Adibayev, a 39-year-old army veteran who showed up at Bishkek’s military conscription office.
The official casualty toll Sunday rose to at least 104 people killed and 1,231 wounded, the Health Ministry said. The ministry said this included 21 dead in the main hospital in Jalal-Abad but not hospitals elsewhere in the region.
Maksat Zheinbekov, the acting mayor of Jalal-Abad, told the AP that Bakiyev’s supporters had triggered the riots by attacking both Uzbeks and Kyrgyz.
Kyrgyz residents interviewed by AP Television News in Osh blamed Uzbeks for starting the rioting by attacking students and Kyrgyz women. Ethnic Kyrgyz from neighbouring villages then streamed into the city to strike back, they said.
“Why have the Uzbeks become so brazen?” said one Osh resident, who gave only her first name, Aigulia, because she feared for her safety. “Why do they burn my house?”
Aigulia said her house was destroyed by Uzbeks overnight and all her Kyrgyz neighbours had to run for their safety. She said the area was still unsafe, claiming Uzbek snipers were shooting at them.
A Kyrgyz man, Iskander, said he and others burned Uzbek property to avenge their attacks.
“Whatever you see over there — all the burnt restaurants and cafes — were owned by them and we destroyed them on purpose,” he told the AP. “Why didn’t they want to live in peace?”
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