Bodyguards for Kyrgyzstan’s embattled president fired shots into the air to help Kurmanbek Bakiyev escape a crowd of 1,000 opponents that disrupted his rally in the country’s south yesterday.
A Reuters photographer and cameraman at the scene both saw some of about 20 bodyguards fire bursts from Kalashnikov rifles, while others ushered Bakiyev into a waiting jeep. His motorcade then sped away from Osh, Kyrgyzstan’s second-largest city.
The gunfire, in two bursts minutes apart, started when opponents of Bakiyev moved toward his meeting from a separate rally in support of the interim government, a reporter at the scene said. There was no immediate sign of casualties.
“The local authorities carried out provocative acts,” Bakiyev aide Ravshan Dzhamgyrchiyev said by telephone from an undisclosed location.
He said Bakiyev was unharmed and had already left the Osh region.
“When we began our rally, groups of their bandits started throwing stones and there was a big threat to the life of the person under guard,” he said.
Bakiyev has been trying to muster support in his southern stronghold since fleeing an April 7 uprising in the capital, Bishkek, during which his troops fired repeatedly into crowds of protesters calling for his resignation.
The interim government, which took power a week ago, has warned it will send special forces to arrest Bakiyev and put him on trial for at least 84 deaths in the uprising, but has yet to try to detain him.
“He is driving back toward Jalalabad. He is not injured,” Bolot Sherniyazov, the interior minister in the interim government, said by telephone.
“The crowd in Osh prevented him from speaking. They shouted: ‘Down with Bakiyev.’ They did not try to attack him. His bodyguards opened fire into the air,” Sherniyazov said.
The standoff between Bakiyev and the interim government is laced from both sides with rhetoric about the threat of further bloodshed in the impoverished Central Asian nation of 5.3 million.
Bakiyev spoke briefly outside a theater in the city before his guards shot into the air.
“I have come to Osh to tell you the truth about the tragic events in Bishkek last week,” he said, standing underneath a banner reading: “The opposition grabbed power. The opposition seized power with blood.”
The interior ministry of the new government has said it was considering sending troops to southern Kyrgyzstan, but that it would not allow a civil war.
The chief of staff to interim government leader Roza Otunbayeva said the interim leadership had repeatedly called on Bakiyev to show restraint.
“Enough blood has been spilt already,” Edil Baisalov said. “This is exactly what Bakiyev wants — either to die like a martyr or to continue using provocative acts.”
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