Moscow, June 14: As ethnic clashes continued in Southern Kyrgyzstan, the Indian Government is making arrangements to evacuate over hundred Indians, mostly students, stranded in the violence-hit areas where the death toll in five days of rioting has crossed 116.
The external affairs ministry clarified in a statement that the Indians in southern Kyrgyzstan included 15 students in Jalalabad and 99 students, a professor and a businessman in Osh. Indian diplomatic sources in the Kyrgyz capital said the mission is arranging for a special aircraft to fly out the Indians from Osh.
Indians, mostly students, trapped in the Central Asian republic’s Osh and Jalalabad towns after ethnic riots.
“As soon the situation permits, the Indians will be flown out to safety,” sources said. “Everything possible will be done to ensure the well being and safety of the Indians,” the sources told “Our mission is in close and regular touch with several Indian nationals as well as with relevant departments of the Kyrgyz government, including the ministry of foreign affairs and security agencies,” said the ministry.
“Everything possible is being done to ensure the safety and well-being of the Indian nationals, within the constraints posed by the difficult ground situation.
“Our mission in Bishkek is monitoring the developments closely and additional steps would be taken as soon as the situation becomes more conducive,” it added.
Indian students trapped amid street violence in southern Kyrgyzstan are getting increasingly worried about their security.
Ethnic violence in south Kyrgyzstan has claimed at least 117 lives and left over 1,000 injured.
“Anyone can die at any moment,” Zaheer Khan, an Indian student, told Times Now channel over the phone from Osh. Indian students, he said, were confined to their homes.
Said student Amrit Das: “The building next to my home is burning. We are stuck inside our home.” The violence on the street has meant that students can’t go to the airport to catch a flight home.
Sumita, who studies in Jalalabad, said students don’t have any money to spend.
Students complained that authorities have asked them to lock their homes from inside. Some said supply of electricity, water and cooking gas had been blocked.
Deadly riots swept through Osh and another southern city of Jalalabad on Friday and Saturday.
Kyrgyz and ethnic Uzbek groups set ablaze cars, and looted stores and markets.
They said the mission was also closely monitoring the situation in the nearby city of Jalalabad near the Uzbek border, where the authorities yesterday clamped a state of
emergency till June 22 and clamped round-the-clock curfew. “Some Indians could also be there and attempts are being
made to ascertain their welfare,” sources said. Kyrgyz Health officials have put the casualties at 113 deaths, with as many as 1,400 people injured. However,Ferghanaru web site quoting its sources in the Uzbek dominated areas said “death toll runs in hundreds.” It said that scores
of dead bodies were lying on the streets of small towns which have compact Uzbek population.
The interim president Roza Otunbayeva has also conceded that the death toll could be higher than official figures as
the interim government struggles to stem the worst ethnic clashes since the end of the Soviet Union.
Interim Kyrgyz President Roza Otunbayeva’s provisional government had over the weekend given security forces shoot-to-kill orders to protect civilians, amid growing calls from foreign leaders and aid groups to end the clashes
The humanitarian situation in southern Kyrgyzstan remains complicated as most businesses have closed down and residents have started facing acute shortages of food and medical supplies.
Officials from the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) are set to gather to discuss ways to resolve the crisis, including possible deployment of a peacekeeping contingent to the violence-hit Kyrgyzstan.
CSTO, a post-Soviet security bloc, comprises Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
—Agencies