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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Uzbekistan refuses international probe

Compiled from wire reports The Spokesman-Review

Tashkent, Uzbekistan Uzbekistan on Thursday again rejected an international investigation of its bloody suppression of an anti-government demonstration but invited foreign diplomats to monitor an internal investigation.

The government says 173 people died May 13 in the eastern city of Andijan and denies troops opened fire on unarmed civilians. Rights advocates say up to 750 people were killed when troops opened fire after protesters seized a local prison and government headquarters. President Islam Karimov has blamed the violence on Islamic militants trying to carve out an Islamic state in formerly Soviet Central Asia. The parliament, consisting entirely of Karimov’s loyalists, has set up a panel to investigate the violence.

Nigara Khidoyatova, the head of the unregistered opposition Free Peasants party, said that the official probe was aimed at covering up the truth.

Canadian child killer will be released soon

Joliette, Quebec Notorious child killer Karla Homolka covered her face and appeared to be crying when her crimes were reviewed Thursday by authorities hoping to restrict her movement after her impending release from prison.

It was her first public appearance since her sentencing in 1993 after she pleaded guilty in the sex slayings of two southern Ontario teenagers Leslie Mahaffy and Kristen French.

Homolka, 35, has served her 12-year manslaughter sentence and is set for release from a Quebec prison July 5, though federal guidelines may allow her release as early as June 23.

Homolka became a symbol of evil to many Canadians when the horrific crimes she perpetrated with her ex-husband Paul Bernardo were revealed at his first-degree murder trial.

In what has been dubbed a “deal with the devil,” Homolka got a reduced sentence by testifying against Bernardo. As part of the plea agreement, she was not charged in the death of her younger sister, 15-year-old Tammy Homolka, who died on Christmas Eve 1990 from choking on her own vomit after she was drugged and raped by the couple.

Serbs arrest men from video of killings

Belgrade, Serbia-Montenegro Serbian police have arrested at least eight men they say are shown in a video killing a group of Bosnian Muslim prisoners from Srebrenica, a top Belgrade official said Thursday.

Up to 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were killed in Srebrenica in 1995 – Europe’s worst mass killing since World War II.

The arrests came after the footage was shown Wednesday at the U.N. court in the Hague, Netherlands, said Rasim Ljajic, head of the Serbia-Montenegro government body in charge of cooperation with the U.N. war crimes tribunal. The footage was also broadcast late Wednesday by several television channels in Serbia and stunned the Balkan republic.

“Serbia is deeply shocked,” President Boris Tadic said. “Those images are proof of a monstrous crime committed against persons of a different religion. And the guilty had walked as free men until now.”