NEWS: Protesters Storm Uzbekistan Prison and Release Inmates., page 1

Soldiers have fired on a crowd of at least 2,000 protesters in the town of Andijan in eastern Uzbekistan. At least one person has been killed, prompting scenes of mass panic as men, women and children fled more gunfire.

Troops sealed off Andijan after thousands of prisoners, including 23 men accused of Islamic extremism, were freed by armed men in a jailbreak. A BBC correspondent in Uzbekistan says unrest in the city feeds off pent-up anger over poverty and unemployment.

Uzbek President Islam Karimov was said to be heading to Andijan, but has not appeared in the city. The 23 accused of Islamic extremism were among up to 4,000 prisoners, including political prisoners and ordinary criminals, freed from jail overnight. Prisoners poured out into the city, some of them carrying guns.

"The people have risen," AP news agency quoted Valijon Atakhonjonov, the brother of a defendant in the long-running trial.

Uzbek officials said nine people were killed and 34 injured during the night, in apparent clashes between protesters and security forces. During Friday, several thousand protesters gathered in Andijan's main square and took over several buildings, calling for "justice" and "freedom".

But troops moved in late on Friday afternoon, opening fire and prompting the crowd to flee. People were screaming, saying their prayers and calling for help, according to the BBC's Monica Whitlock, in Tashkent. All foreign news broadcasts, including those of the BBC, have been blocked for domestic audiences.

In the capital Tashkent, 300 km away, a man was shot dead outside the Israeli embassy, upon suspicion he was a suicide bomber. Our correspondent says the incident, while apparently unrelated to the protests, shows how tense the situation has become. Andijan is one of the main cities in the most politically sensitive part of this country, our correspondent says.

It is the barometer of feeling for a long, densely populated valley called Ferghana with a long tradition of independent thought, and the authoritarian government in Tashkent has always eyed the valley with suspicion, she says.

The government has locked up probably thousands of local young men, many of them prominent members of the community, accusing them of Islamic extremism. Neighbouring Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan have shut their borders with Uzbekistan. Protests in Kyrgyzstan in March resulted in the overthrow of its then President, Askar Akayev.

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Islam Karimov has ruled over Uzbekistan as a dictator since the fall of the USSR in 1991. The regime is a one party state with Karimov's party holding all the seats in it's 'parliament' and always winning 98% to 100% in 'elections'. Ironically the ruling party is called the 'Peoples Democratic Party'.

Unlike the more pro Russian dictators of the ex-USSR, like Lukashenko (Belarus), Kuchma (ex-ruler of Ukraine) and Shevednaze (ex-ruler of Georgia), Karimov is very much in favour with the US government and is a key ally of the US 'war on terrorism'.

Not once has the US ever criticised the Uzbek regimes heavy use of torture and killing of political prisoners or the use in Uzbekistan of child slaves for cotton picking, a key 'industry' that keeps the corrupt dicatorship afloat.

Does everyone remember how supportive the US was of the 'revolutions' in the Ukraine and Georgia. Especially in the case of Georgia were the involvement of the US was more pronouced due to Georgia having pipelines that pumped oil out of the Caspian Sea into the Black Sea for the West.

The US NEVER supports real revolutions where power is put in the hands of the people and the economy is run by the people. The US support for these uprisings in the ex-Soviet states is a planned policy of managing the trasner of power from pro Russian rulers to pro US ones, with the help of the CIA/other US agencies and the imperialist backed proxies in the respective countries (Shakasvili, in Georgia for example). Its nothing more than a more open and aggressive phase in imperialist power politics.

However as the dictatorship of Islam Karimov is VERY close to US imperialism and Karimov allowed the US to set up a military base (complete with stationed US troops and jet fighters and Uzbekistan refuels the US fighters with their own oil for free!) so the Americans could invade Afghanistan.

As well as allowing the US to use Uzbekistan as a permanent base, Karimov also crushes with total barbarity, any opposition to his rule or to the power of the US imperialist system. Karimovs regime has a routine to call ANY opposition to itself or the US as 'Islamic terrorism', regardless of the ideological loyalties of those who oppose the regime.

Ironically as the US was so supportive of the uprisings in the Ukraine and Georgia (the US even said that if violence broke out in those two uprisings, the fault lay with the regimes who leave people with no other alternative than force), in Uzbekistan, the US government came out with the line that BOTH sides should try and aviod violence, which in effect means that the protesters should give up and allow the Karimov regime to stay in power as the regime has the means of force on their side (the military/secret police).

The only reason the US takes this line is that they don't want to see Karimov fall and that the Uzbek rebels are a genuine movement, not some US backed/funded 'pro democracy network' with some US trained professional politician is flown in to assume power (like Shakasvili). The Uzbek rebels could, if they overthrow Karimov, ask the US to leave its bases in the country and to use the nations mineral wealth for its own development as opposed to the interests of global capital.

Karimov is the MOST bloody and dictatorial of the ex-USSR rulers. Unlike the strongmen of Belarus, Ukraine and Georgia, Karimov doesn't use fraud to win over his opponent in 'elections', Karimov is the ONLY candidate and other parties are banned, not just subverted. Karimov runs a proper dictatorship and not some strong armed democracy, so of all the tyrranies that should of been overthrown, Karimov should of been the first to go.

Yet the hypocracy of the US is as usual, just sickening!

I only hope that an anti US imperialist regime emerges from this Uzbek revolt. It would weaken the US war machine in the region and the US would lose valuable gold and oil markets.

I would much prefer a Taliban style Islamist regime in Uzbekistan than some 'lets accomodate with the US/global economy 'democracy'!!!