Rumours trigger tension in Kyrgyz

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Wild rumours of more violence flew through Kyrgyzstan’s ravaged south Saturday, stoking tensions in a region on edge after the worst ethnic clashes since the collapse of the Soviet Union. “On Saturday, the Army will clean out the Uzbek districts,” warned a hotel owner who gave his name only as Bakha. “The Kyrgyz state will attack us to carry out a genocide,” predicted Bakhtiyar Akhmedov, an Uzbek man living in a district where makeshift barricades still stand outside homes.

Rumours have swirled around Kyrgyzstan’s southern cities of Osh and Jalalabad since violent ethnic clashes between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks erupted last week. The central Asian country’s interim leader Roza Otunbayeva said 2,000 people may have been killed in the violence.
Careless talk could provoke fresh fighting, said a spokeswoman for the interim government, which is struggling to assert its control over the region. “Every day we have to refute the craziest rumours,” said the spokeswoman, Roza Daudova. “This is dangerous, because a spark would be enough to restart the riots.”
The stories are often “rumours of violence,” Ms Daudova said, but added that the word on the street even touched on Ms Otunbayeva’s personal life. “One story says that Otunbayeva no longer criticises Uzbeks because she has secretly married an Uzbek man,” Ms Daudova said.
Interim government officials also contributed to the flow of rumours, however. Visiting Osh on Friday, Ms Otunbayeva warned she had “information” that fresh riots were being plotted in the capital Bishkek and in a northern region.
On Wednesday, deputy prime minister Almazbek Atambayev publicly accused the son of deposed President Kurmanbek Bakiyev of paying $10 million to orchestrate the riots.
Osh residents also blamed media reports for contributing to a distorted picture of events and raising tensions. “It’s the Uzbeks who are attacked us! And you say that we are the killers,” one Kyrgyz woman complained.
Conversely, Uzbeks accused the media of taking the side of ethnic Kyrgyz residents. —AFP