In an official statement on 1 August, Uzbekistan\'s Foreign Ministry harshly criticized the recent evacuation of 339 Uzbek refugees from Kyrgyzstan to Romania as a \"violation of all procedures and norms of international law and UN resolutions,\" official news agency UzA reported. The ministry said the evacuation was unnecessary because the \"displaced citizens\" posed no threat to security on the Kyrgyz-Uzbek border. Blaming \"outside forces\" for pressuring Kyrgyzstan, the statement concluded, \"Uzbekistan\'s Foreign Ministry views all of this as the unacceptable and crude interference of outside forces in an attempt to play the card of the so-called \'Uzbek refugees\' and continue the undeclared information war, which was planned, like the \'Andijon operation\' itself, long before the tragic events of 13 May in Andijon.\" (RFE/RL)