May 17, 2005, 9:36PM

Uzbekistan admits riot death toll was larger

Government's total is still much lower than what survivors say

KARASU, KYRGYZSTAN - Uzbekistan acknowledged on Tuesday that its crackdown last week on an anti-government demonstration and a prison break had been far more violent than it previously described, saying 169 people had been killed, including 32 troops.

The Uzbek president, Islam Karimov, said Saturday that only 10 soldiers and a larger but unspecified number of "rebels" had been killed.

Despite the big increase in the casualty figures, announced in Tashkent by Karimov and Prosecutor General Rashid Kadyrov, the government's total still fell much below the estimates of survivors and witnesses, who have said the death toll was in the hundreds.

One opposition party, for example, said Tuesday that it had compiled a list of 745 dead.

While Karimov and Kadyrov offered a more complete picture of the disorder, they also insisted that troops had not deliberately fired on or killed any civilians. Their assertion contradicted the accounts of many survivors, who have said that troops and armored vehicles rushed a public square in Andijan and fired indiscriminately.

The violence began on Thursday night when armed men and demonstrators protesting what they regarded as the rigged trial of 23 businessmen stormed a prison in the Fergana Valley, releasing 2,000 prisoners and taking soldiers hostage.