By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow : At least 170 people have been killed in ethnic clashes in southern Kyrgyzstan, forcing authorities to evacuate more than 2,000 people from the country, media reports said Tuesday.
During the last two days 1,550 adults and 700 children were evacuated from the country, Kyrgyz 24.kg private news agency reported citing head of the civil aviation agency, Alexander Nastaev.
“Yesterday we sent home 580 foreign residents – to Turkey, Pakistan, Turkmenistan,” Nastaev said.
The toll continues to rise and the government said that 826 people were hospitalised as a result of the clashes between ethnic Kyrgyz and Uzbek that swept through the country’s second largest city of Osh and another southern city of Jalal-Abad, beginning Thursday.
Tens of thousands of ethnic Uzbeks have fled across the border to Uzbekistan to escape the rioting, which has seen cars set on fire and stores, markets and residential buildings smashed, looted and burned.
The United Nations Security Council held an emergency meeting Monday, urging an end to the bloodshed and demanding that humanitarian aid be delivered unimpeded to the affected people.
Meanwhile, the post-Soviet security bloc Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) has offered emergency assistance to law-enforcement agencies in Kyrgyzstan.
“They have enough strength for today, but do not have enough equipment, helicopters, ground transportation, logistics and even gasoline, oil and lubricants,” CSTO secretary general Nikolai Bordyuzha said.