– UZBEKISTAN’S 07/2004 ATTACKS

On 07/30/2004, just four months after the March 2004 Attacks, the same terror infrastructure committed yet another attack when three suicide bombers blew themselves up near the Israeli and the nearby USA embassies in Tashkent, Uzbekistan’s capital. A third blast hit general prosecutor’s office.

A day earlier the trial of 14 defendants charged for committing the March 2004 Attacks began in Tashkent and all security forces were in high alert. Due to the security measures only two local security guards on the Israeli embassy and a policeman near the USA embassy were killed by the multiple bombings. Eight other by passers were injured.

Eventually an ephemeral unknown militant organization “Uzbek Islamic Jihad” took responsibility on the attacks. Security officials claimed that “Uzbek Islamic Jihad” is, in fact, a cover name for the Islamic Jihad Union -IJU, a split of the Islamic Movement of UZBEKISTAN -IMU.

Uzbekistan authorities claimed, after their investigation, that 8 of the suspects, who were arrested after the July 2004 attacks, as wall as some who participated in the previous March 2004 attacks, came from the Kazakh town of Shimkent, 120 km to the north of Tashkent, Uzbekistan’s capital. Shimkent is one of the places outside Uzbekistan were Islamic activists, many of them from the Islamic party “Hizb-ut-Tahrir al-Islami” (The Islamic Liberation party) led by Ata abu-Rashta, which is operating in Uzbekistan since the 60s’, found refuge from the persecutions of the Uzbek police and security services.

 

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