Uzbek police surround terror suspects

The troops cornered an unknown number of terrorists northeast of the capital Tashkent not far from the official residence of President Islam Karimov and were trying to "expose and exterminate" the militants, Foreign Ministry spokesman Ilkhom Zakirov said.

The operation began last morning, but Zakirov had no details on how many troops were involved in the sweep. Soldiers and police used empty trucks and an armored personnel carrier to block vehicles along the road to Karimov's residence.

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The sweep followed a two-day spasm of violence that began Sunday evening, killing 19 people and wounded 26, including two suicide bombings the country's first-ever such attacks two assaults on police and an explosion at a bomb-making hideaway.

Karimov has blamed the violence on Islamic extremists, and said several arrests had been made.

The president said Monday that backing for the attacks might have come from a banned radical group that has never before been linked to terrorist acts Hizb ut-Tahrir, or the Party of Liberation. The group has denied responsibility.

A police source told a Western diplomat in Tashkent that a man in a car blew himself up Tuesday after being chased by police, and that a shootout had erupted at an apartment that authorities raided to capture three alleged suspects.

Several people were injured in the violence, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported, citing police sources.

The US Embassy in Tashkent also said an explosion took place near a police checkpoint Tuesday on the road heading out of Tashkent toward the president's official residence. An embassy annex office remained closed and visa operations were suspended, but other business went on as usual.

Security was also beefed up across the city Tuesday, with soldiers on patrol and hotels deploying metal detectors and not allowing vehicles to approach.

The violence began Sunday night with a blast that killed 10 people at a house used by alleged terrorists in the central region of Bukhara, Prosecutor-General Rashid Kadyrov said Monday.

Police found 50 bottles with homemade ingredients for bombs and instructions on how to make them, a Kalashnikov rifle, two pistols, ammunition and extremist Islamic literature, he said.