Uzbek officials took foreign diplomats and journalists on a lightning-quick tour of Andijan today, showing them a prison and the local administration building and arranging meetings with local officials, as the top UN human rights official called for an independent investigation.

Flowers dotted the streets and freshly-dug graves scarred the earth across the eastern Uzbek city of Andijan as residents mourned what witnesses said were hundreds killed by security forces last week – the worst unrest since the former Soviet republic won independence in 1991.

TRAUMATISED refugees last night slammed the Bush administration for legitimating Uzbek President Islam Karimov.

Gunfire persisted today in the eastern city where Uzbek security forces fired on protesters last week – a clash that reportedly left several hundred dead - and new reports emerged that violence in nearby towns killed hundreds more, further threatening the stability of the government.

Sporadic shooting continued today in an eastern Uzbek city where an uprising sparked a crackdown by security forces that left up to 500 people dead, and a human rights group reported that clashes in another town killed an additional 200 people.