Weekly news wrap

Police in Uzbekistan's capital on Tuesday dispersed protestors holding a public meeting to mark 40 days - a tradition in Muslim societies of Central Asia - since the violent suppression of protests in the eastern city of Andijan last month, AFP reported. The Uzbek government said the Andijan death toll was 173, while rights groups say upwards of 1,000 may have been killed when security forces opened fire on protesters indiscriminately. Around 15 human rights activists laid flowers at a monument in the capital, Tashkent, that commemorates the victims of a 1966 earthquake. British soldiers will not be sent back to Uzbekistan to train with the country's military, The Scotsman newspaper reported on Tuesday, citing the Birtish Ministry of Defence (MoD). The Scotsman said that 150 British soldiers had taken part last year in 'Exercise Timur Express', with Uzbek forces. The MoD said in a written statement on Sunday that the military support had been an "annual training exercise", meant to encourage military reform in Uzbekistan. However, an MoD spokesman said: "There will be no such exercise this year - there are no current plans to return." In Tajikistan, President Emomali Rahmonov and his Afghan counterpart Hamid Karzai pledged on Saturday to work more closely together to battle extremism, terrorism and drug smuggling, AFP reported. Drug trafficking is a prime concern for the two nations as Tajikistan serves as one of the main transit routes for drugs produced in Afghanistan, the world's chief opium and heroin producer and destined for Russian and European markets. The two leaders met earlier on the same day to lay the foundation stone of a US-funded bridge that will span their countries' river border. The construction comes amid efforts by a number of Central Asian countries to restore their historic role as a land bridge between surrounding regions by improving road and rail links. Construction of the bridge, measuring 670 metres in length, is to get started when water levels drop in the autumn, and is expected to take two years. Staying in Tajikistan, the US voiced concern about the case of Makhmadruzi Iskandarov, a Tajik opposition leader who is in custody and urged Tajik authorities to give him access to lawyers, AP reported on Tuesday. Iskandarov has been "denied regular and unobserved access" to his lawyers and has not been allowed to meet his family, Stephan Minikes, the US Ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said in a statement released by the US Embassy in Dushanbe. Iskandarov, the leader of the opposition Democratic Party who said he would run for the presidency next year in Tajikistan, went missing in Moscow on 15 April after being freed by Russian authorities. He had been detained four months earlier in Moscow on a Tajik extradition request. Shortly after, Tajik authorities said Iskandarov was under arrest in Tajikistan on charges of terrorism, illegal possession of arms, attempted murder, abuse of office and theft of state funds. His lawyers said he had been kidnapped and forcibly flown to Tajikistan. In Kazakhstan, a man was hospitalised in the south on Saturday with symptoms suggestive of anthrax, according to the Kazakh emergency ministry. The Russian Itar-Tass news agency reported that the man, 47, was undergoing treatment at a specialised hospital for infectious diseases in the southern city of Chimkent. Doctors identified five people who contacted the patient and all of them underwent blood tests. Meanwhile, special measures to prevent the spread of the disease were underway. Kyrgyz authorities appealed to international organisations and foreign embassies for assistance to deal with damage caused by a recent wave of natural disasters that hit the country, the Russian Interfax news agency reported on Monday. Acting Kyrgyz emergency minister, Janysh Rustenbekov, said that following heavy rains and subsequent mudflows in southern Kyrgyzstan, almost 150 houses, along with crop fields hade been damaged. "The families which sustained damage were moved to safe areas. Now funds should be sought for them to build new houses before it gets cold," Rustenbekov said. The Central Asian region is prone to a number of natural disasters, including earthquakes, landslides, floods, avalanches and drought, with Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan being the most vulnerable countries. A report by the European Commission Humanitarian Aid Office (ECHO) suggested that natural disasters had killed about 2,500 people and affected some 5.5 million (almost 10 percent of the total population) in Central Asia over the past decade.