Kyrgyz forces clash with Uzbeks

“During a security operation, law enforcement forces were met with armed resistance in the village of Nariman. According to preliminary information, two civilians died,” he said.

Solvang said about 20 people were wounded, adding that doctors were unable, for security reasons, to reach outlying areas where they suspect more wounded people might be in need of help.

Tense situation

“It’s very tense. The authorities have to be very careful about ways of doing these checks,” he said.

Tolekan Ismailova, a prominent human rights campaigner in Osh, said the operation was carried out in response to the killing of a Kyrgyz policeman in an Uzbek settlement last week.

“There are a lot of wounded hiding in the houses. Young people are being taken away somewhere,” she said.

Monday’s clashes came amid efforts by Kyrgyzstan’s interim leadership to restore order in the country’s south after days of ethnic clashes.

Ethnic Uzbeks say they were targeted by members of the Kyrgyz community and that security forces had colluded against them.

Victims of the unrest say the violence was a brutal and orchestrated campaign targeting Uzbeks, who make up 14 per cent of Kyrgyzstan’s population of 5.3 million.

Many Uzbek neighbourhoods in southern Kyrgyzstan were burnt to the ground by mobs of ethnic Kyrgyz. Nearly half of the region’s 800,000 Uzbeks are believed to have fled across the border to Uzbekistan.