Troops loyal to Uzbekistan's hard-line President Islam Karimov opened fire Friday on protesters and counter-attacked insurgents who had briefly seized control of central Andijan, the ex-Soviet republic's fourth largest city. Panic erupted as soldiers drove a truck into the eastern Uzbek city's main square and began shooting into a crowd of 5,000 that was demonstrating against Karimov's government. An AFP correspondent saw at least one person killed and five wounded.
Troops then moved in against armed anti-Karimov insurgents who had seized public buildings and freed 2,000 prisoners from the local prison, where 23 men accused of Islamic extremism were being held. The night-time raid left at least nine dead and 34 wounded, according to the government.
Soldiers in armoured personnel carriers and lorries spread throughout the city and by late Friday the brutal counter-offensive appeared to have brought the city back under control.
Russia's Interfax agency, quoting local police, said security forces retook the administration building on the main square after what had been particularly intense fighting.
Police also said hostages held in the building had been released. There was no immediate independent confirmation.
It was one of the most serious crises to shake Uzbekistan, which is run by an authoritarian government and hosts a major US air base used for operations in Afghanistan, since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Andijan, which has a population of 300,000, is near the border of Kyrgyzstan in the densely populated and impoverished Ferghana valley, where Islamic sentiment is traditionally strong.
The violence followed days of protests in the city against the trial of the 23 men, who were charged with forming a cell of the outlawed Islamic group Akromiya.
Supporters said the charges against the men, mostly businessmen, had been trumped up by Karimov's government, which is widely accused of using torture and arbitrary arrests to keep potential opponents under control.
Freeing those 23 men appeared to have been the main original goal of the insurgents.
Late Thursday they raided a military garrison for its weapons, then stormed the city administration building before breaking into the prison.
Witnesses described their terror as the violence erupted.
Meanwhile in the capital Tashkent, the US embassy initially reported that a would-be suicide bomber was shot outside the Israeli embassy. Uzbek officials later said the man turned out to be unarmed.
Bombings at the US and Israeli embassies last year killed two people and were claimed by a group calling itself the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.
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