I just translated several items (interspersed with my comments):
From Echo of Moscow radio:
13:33 16.05.2005 There are 75 bodies in the Andijan morgueThe "buried on the streets without being identified" claim sounds like something that could be used later by people who want to inflate the death toll.
Interfax, citing its sources, reports that these are the bodies of people who died with weapons in their hands. Earlier the Uzbek Ministry of Internal Affairs officially announced that 70 people perished during the unrest in Andijan. Meanwhile, information agencies have cited very different figures. According to them, during the unrest at least 500 people died. Many of them were buried on the streets of the city without being identified.
From Interfax:
In the Andijan morgue there are bodies of 75 people who put up armed resistance during the unrest in the city, according to a telephone report to Interfax by a medical worker in the city.Claiming that "all of these people" were putting up a fight is ridiculous because it is impossible to verify, and this constitutes a claim that will surely be used by people who want to deflate the death toll or demonstrate that the authorities shot only those people who were putting up resistance. So expect continued distortion on both sides of this discussion, which will be played out in further contradictory reports of the number of casualties.
"All of these people were putting up armed resistance to law enforcement officers and were killed in shoot-outs," said the agency's source.
"Currently they are being identified. Among them may be criminals who escaped from the prison," said the source. [the rest of the article is accessible to paid Interfax subscribers only, but I am sure Western wires will pick this up.]
70 organizers of the unrest in Andijan have been arrested - MVD headThe comment about local residents cooperating is probably geared to make other local residents who are as yet undecided on how they feel about what's happened decide they should also be on the side of the authorities.
Tashkent. 16 May. Interfax - Uzbek authorities have arrested no fewer than 70 organizers of the unrest in Andijan, reported the country's Minister of Internal Affairs, Zakir Almatov, at a meeting with representatives of the city's community last Sunday.
He also announced that some of the inmates of the pre-trial detention facility had voluntarily returned to jail.
Z. Almatov called on Andijanians to unify their efforts at bringing order to the city. He noted with satisfaction that city residents are assisting the authorities. "People are turning in weapons abandoned by the criminals and providing essential information to law enforcement agencies," he said.
RIA Novosti is more exact about the number of people back in jail:
Tashkent, 16 May - RIA Novosti. 266 of the inmates who had been liberated by rebels on the evening of Friday, May 13, have returned voluntarily to the Andijan pretrial detention facility, the Uzbek Ministry of Internal Affairs told RIA Novosti.All I can say about this is, consider the source. Over half of the escapees returned "voluntarily"? I don't think that would happen in any jailbreak, anywhere in the world.
As a result of the unrest, extremists freed roughly 500 out of 600 inmates from the jail. Roughly 100 inmates did not leave the jail. [...]
4 comments:
Actually, although the true number is not known, some of the liberated prisoners have voluntarily returned to the prison. Some didn't want to be "liberated" in the first instance because they believed they would be caught and the reprisals would be - to put it lightly - severe.
Be wary of reports from Russian media sources. Those favored by the Russian government are being allowed into Andijon. Those not in favor are not and are not being supported by the Russian embassy in Uzbekistan.
On the inmates, that's a very good point. I did have the thought (trying to put myself in the position of a guy who was just in the wrong jail at the wrong time) that perhaps if one had escaped in this way - had rushed out or had been rushed out in a mass exodus rather than a jailbreak one had taken part in planning - and knew that the area one was in was cordoned off by security forces who were killing escaped inmates (and others), you might give yourself up as the lesser of two evils.
On the "Russian media," I am sure that what you're saying is true about the treatment of journalists, and I personally always take reports from RIA Novosti (Russian and state-owned)and Interfax (Russian and privately owned, I think, but probably with loyalties to the government) with a grain of salt. I've been translating these reports not because I think they are the best information out there, but mainly because they are often, at the time I post them, the freshest information out there; and because they are not usually available in English.
One of my goals of all of my blogging on the situation in Uzbekistan is to provide information that is either not widely publicized or not available elsewhere in English. Thus, my focus on the Russian media. Maybe I should put up some kind of a disclaimer about the Russian wire services, but I hadn't really thought about doing that until now.
I do put up items from English-language sources if I think they've summed up a point or aspect of the story particularly well, but I am not really trying to provide a comprehensive picture of the situation (Nathan does a much better job of that).
So, your point is well taken, and I'll do my best to filter sources better or at least warn people who may not be familiar with the Russian wires' periodic credibility problems, which often stem from their uncritical reporting of official statements - but in this case, as you say, may also be a result of preferential access which they may be receiving to a restricted area.
Thank you for commenting - I do wish Blogger made it easier for people to comment and leave a name, so that everyone wouldn't be "anonymous" - maybe things like this will motivate me eventually to move this blog to a different platform.
Please understand I wasn't quibbling with your coverage. You do an excellent job and making Russian language material available to English speakers is very valuable. The point I was making regarding Russian media was simply to urge caution, which I think you understand.
For some of us, "anonymous" is best because if our identity became known we might lost our ability to access sources directly involved in what is going on in Uzbekistan.
Understood. Thanks for reading and commenting, and stay safe down there. Let us know if your sources have any news, or even just observations on what it's feeling like in Uzbekistan on this Tuesday morning - you may want to comment with any real news at Registan, it has a bigger audience so the story will get out faster.
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