More Uzbek Arrests

Mass Arrests of Oppositionists Reported in Uzbekistan

30.05.2005

MosNews

Uzbek police detained dozens of opposition activists over the weekend,
an opposition party leader said on Monday.

"Within the last two days, police have detained dozens of our party
members, saying we are hiding terrorists involved in the recent
uprising in the Fergana Valley," Vasilya Inoyatova, the leader of the
outlawed Birlik party, or Unity, was quoted by AP as saying.

She said at least 20 activists who had come from the eastern Fergana
Valley for a party meeting in Tashkent were detained this morning, and
that other Birlik members and her relatives, including her husband and
26-year-old son, had been arrested earlier.

On Sunday, Inoyatova and representatives of three other outlawed
opposition parties met with three US senators - John McCain of
Arizona, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, and John Sununu of New
Hampshire - who added their voices to Western calls for the Central
Asian nation's leadership to allow an international investigation into
the bloodshed.

A human rights activist, Surat Ikramov, said today police were
preventing him from leaving his home in the capital Tashkent and that
he had received calls from numerous other rights activists who either
had been detained or were forcibly isolated in their homes.

The detentions follow the uprising that erupted in the eastern city of
Andijan on May 13, when militants seized a local prison and government
headquarters and thousands of protesters hit the streets. Uzbek
authorities say 173 people died, but deny they opened fire on unarmed
civilians. Human rights activists claim there were up to 750 people
killed.


Update: the BBC has a report here.