UZBEKISTAN: The international community delivered a low-key response yesterday to the crisis in Uzbekistan, Chris Stephen writes.
United Nations and Red Cross aid workers in neighbouring Kyrgystan set up camps for several thousand refugees who crossed the border to escape the fighting.
British foreign secretary Jack Straw called on the Uzbek authorities to allow Red Cross officials to investigate Friday's massacre. "The situation is very serious, there has been a clear abuse of human rights," he said.
Tashkent reacted angrily to Mr Straw's comments in a letter to Britain's ambassador to Uzbekistan. The letter, according to a Russian news agency, said: "How did Mr Jack Straw know that the law enforcement agencies started shooting demonstrators if nothing of this kind ever happened?"
Meanwhile Russia's foreign minister Sergei Lavrov met his French counterpart Michel Barnier in Vienna to discuss a common response.
The muted reaction comes amid fears in both both Russia and the US about the spread of Islamic terrorism across Central Asia. Both powers see the regime of president Islam Karimov as a necessary bulwark against terrorism, and have been criticised by human rights groups for not doing more to combat rights abuses in Uzbekistan.
Opponents of the regime claim that any opposition is stamped on, and Human Rights Watch have listed numerous cases of imprisonment and torture.
Another problem facing the international community is the remoteness of Uzbekistan. Landlocked, it is difficult to reach and airports and borders are closed.