Search for bodies in Uzbekistan

Soldiers and tanks were deployed on the streets of this eastern Uzbek city in the volatile Fergana Valley, the scene of the most violent clashes in this impoverished Central Asian nation on Afghanistan's northern border in more than a year.

Smoke billowed from a government building that burned during the night and the streets were mostly empty of people and cars. The exception was the morgue, where relatives came to look for their missing loved ones.

"I have been looking for two days for the bodies of my brothers," said Bakhadyr Yergachyov, clutching his siblings' passports.

"They are neither at the morgue nor at the hospitals. I know that they had gone to the square to participate in the demonstrations."

An accurate death toll from the violence was impossible to come by, as soldiers guarding the city morgue and hospitals denied entry to reporters amid a general media clampdown by the autocratic government.

AFP correspondents had seen up to 50 bodies on the streets, and local witnesses spoke of seeing up to 300 dead.

The bloodshed started early Friday, when weeks-long demonstrations over a trial of 23 local businessmen boiled over. Prosec-utors had accused the men of belonging to an outlawed Islamic group, but their supporters said the charges were fabricated.