Uzbekistan has launched a massive hunt for suspects after two women set off bombs at a children's store and bus stop in the capital - the first suicide attacks in the former Soviet Central Asia that's now a key supporter of the U.S.-led war on terror. President Islam Karimov blamed Islamic extremists for the violence Sunday and Monday and said several arrests were made already. He said backing for the attacks might have come from a banned radical group that has never before been linked to terrorist acts - Hizb ut-Tahrir, or the Party of Liberation. The group denied responsibility.
| "Who? Us? No, no! Certainly not!" |
"I call on everyone to unite and protect our country from enemies like this, to come forward against them as one fist," Karimov, the country's former Soviet leader who has held power since before Uzbekistan's 1991 independence, said on state-run television. The U.S. Embassy in Tashkent warned that "other terrorists are believed still at large and may be attempting additional attacks."
| Sounds like the offensive's under way. I still wonder what it has to do with the late festivities in South Waziristan, and whether it's IMU — and whether there's a difference between IMU and Hizb ut-Tahrir. |
"The attacks are yet another example of the importance of continued cooperation against those who would stop at nothing to achieve their misguided goals," U.S. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said in Washington.
| Which is why we should be helping the Uzbeks hunt the Bad Guys down and kill them... |
Police found 50 bottles with homemade ingredients for bombs and instructions on how to make them, a Kalashnikov rifle, two pistols, ammunition and extremist Islamic literature, he said. The two assaults on police took place at a factory Sunday night and a traffic checkpoint early Monday. Three officers were killed. One accused terrorist was arrested Sunday night after police stopped his vehicle and found 10 homemade bombs inside, but another suspect escaped, Kadyrov said.
| That'd probably be the guy they really want to catch, though they can content themselves with thumping on the one they got for now... |
Officials declined to give further details about the attacks, which went unmentioned on state-run TV until Monday evening. Bazaars and shops were closed and soldiers armed with Kalashnikovs were on guard outside Tashkent's central department store and across the city. Police and intelligence agents closed off the Chorsu bazaar, one of the biggest in Tashkent, and vans carrying investigators were massed in front of Children's World. Uzbek television showed a streak of blood across the sidewalk in front of the store and spattered on walls inside, with workers sweeping up heaps of shattered glass. Karimov said the attacks were planned six to eight months in advance and had been originally set to take place around the Central Asian new year holiday Navruz, which falls on March 21, but that heavy security prevented them. The planning and money required to carry out such attacks also indicated they had outside support, he said.
| Comes as a surprise, huh? |
In London, where Hizb ut-Tahrir operates openly, the group denied responsibility for the attacks. "Hizb ut-Tahrir does not engage in terrorism, violence or armed struggle," said spokesman Imran Waheed. "We feel these explosions come at a very opportune moment for the Uzbek regime. ... One has to wonder whether the finger of blame should be pointed at the Uzbek regime itself."
| I've noticed that Bad Guys often make that charge. I've yet to see one substantiated, even in Turkey, where it could have been true ten years ago... |
Uzbek authorities have insisted the group is a breeding ground for terrorists and have sought to have Washington label it a terrorist group.
| I agree. It should be. It funnels bad boys into the hard core groups, while maintaining a face just this side of legitimacy... |
Uzbekistan's tiny opposition, banned by Karimov's authoritarian regime from working openly, feared the attacks would deepen a widespread crackdown against dissent and independent Islamic mosques that has led to the jailings of thousands and evoked international condemnation. Karimov said the attacks also bore similarities to the February 1999 bombings in Tashkent that authorities allege targeted the president and killed 16 people. |