Refugees who fled a crackdown by Uzbek troops said today they are not able to return home, and the United Nations has stepped up pressure for an inquiry into deaths believed to have run into hundreds.
Presdient Islam Karimov assured UN Secretary General Kofi Annan that the situation is under control
Uzbek President Islam Karimov rebuffed the latest call from the UN despite witness testimony that troops had opened fire on peaceful protesters a week ago in the eastern town of Andizhan.
"We feared they would finish us off in Andizhan so we decided to flee to Kyrgyzstan," said Khasan Shakirov (27) whose said his two brothers had disappeared. "I will not return."
More than 500 people were crammed into a small refugee camp just 150 metres on the Kyrgyz side of the border. In interviews, they said they were ordinary people, not terrorists.
"I was running in the crowd to survive. Those who left the crowd were finished off by snipers," said Nabidzhan Yunusov, a 41-year-old market trader.
Uzbek government troops opened fire after protesters stormed a prison in the eastern city of Andijan last Friday, freed inmates and seized local government offices. Many of the demonstrators were citizens complaining about poverty and unemployment.
Mr Karimov's government has denied that troops fired at civilians, and he blamed Islamic militants for the unrest. The government says 169 people died in Andijan, but opposition activists say more than 700 were killed - over 500 in Andijan and about 200 in nearby Pakhtabad - most of them civilians.
Uzbekistan, with 26 million inhabitants the most populous state in ex-Soviet Central Asia, is an ally in President Bush's "war on terrorism". It hosts an American air base which serves as a waystation for operations in Afghanistan.
A top US officer said operations had been cut back in the wake of the unrest. "We have decided to make sure that we're cautious about how we're operating," said General John Abizaid, head of US Central Command.
Nato, with which Uzbekistan co-operates in the Partnership for Peace programme, and the European Union have joined calls for an urgent investigation.
Despite President Karimov's refusal, the UN special investigator on extrajudicial killings, Philip Alston, pushed to be allowed into the country, and the International Committee of the Red Cross is seeking access to those who had been wounded or arrested.
"Quite apart from the need to distinguish political opponents from terrorists, the point is that governments are clearly obligated to address any such situations within a framework clearly governed by human rights law," Mr Alston said.
Last night UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said after a telephone conversation with President Karimov that "He [Karimov]
said he had the situation under control and was taking every measure to bring those responsible to account and didn't need an international team to establish the facts."