The coverage of the situation with the invasion of Islamic extremists into Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan given by Russian mass media has been aimed at increasing the tension in the region

The coverage of the situation with the invasion of Islamic extremists into Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan given by Russian mass media has been aimed at increasing the tension in the region, President of Uzbekistan Islam Karimov told the Vremya Novostei newspaper on Monday. "The goal of it all is to create insecurity and panic in Central Asia and, most importantly, to show the helplessness of Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and, perhaps, Tajikistan in their attempts to oppose threats from northern Afghanistan. They seem to be trying to say that the only way to be saved is to become united and that Uzbekistan should again enter the CIS Collective Security Treaty, out of which we dropped some time ago," Karimov said in the interview. "This campaign had one goal: to assure the public that Russian troops should come here or Russian bases should be created here," he said. "Uzbekistan did not invite and is not going to invite any armed forces from abroad, we have never raised this question and will not raise it. Uzbekistan is capable of defending itself," the President said.