Relatives await news of Mongolia riot detainees

ULAN BATOR (Reuters) - Mongolia lifts its four-day state of emergency late on Saturday, but relatives are still waiting for news of those detained in the post-election riots that prompted the imposition of emergency rule.

Some 700 people were taken into custody following violence on Tuesday night over perceived election fraud, when stone-throwing mobs torched the headquarters of the ruling Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party (MPRP).

"I am worried and people here are saying different things about the situation, such as the detainees being beaten up," said one woman, who said her son had been missing for three days.

"Some of them went up the hill and saw detainees made to squat down and walk in line ... They talked about such harsh conditions," the woman added.

She was one of several anxious relatives waiting outside the Denjiin Myanga detention centre, many of whom said they had received no word on the condition of their family members or whether and where they were being housed.

"When I asked the Sukhbaatar district police about his whereabouts, they asked me to go to the state investigation office," said the woman, who did not want to be identified.

"Later, the state investigation office sent me here. But I also cannot find any information about him here. So I am just waiting," she said.

The status of those detained is one of several questions being raised following the president's declaration of a state of emergency on Tuesday, the first since the country shook off Soviet influence and embraced democratic reform in 1990.

At least three of the five killed in the riot were determined to have died from gunshot wounds, and local newspapers have reported that several more in hospital had gunshot injuries.

The opposition Democratic Party, which alleges fraud in last Sunday's election, which international observers say was largely fair, established a working group to investigate accounts of homicide during the riot.

Security forces were mandated to use rubber bullets and tear gas to bring the thousands of protesters under control, but were not authorized to use lethal force.

The party has also announced it will evaluate the impact on the media of emergency rule, under which only state television is permitted to broadcast on air.

For those waiting at the detention centre in the poor suburb of Ulan Bator, one of several outlying areas where unemployment and alcoholism run high, the promise of a long-term investigation may bring little comfort.

Some said they were pushed around by police when they demanded information.

One woman, who said her son was only out buying groceries on the night of the riot, said she was worried that authorities might force him to confess involvement.

"First I found out that he was here but the next time I came, his name was not on the list anymore," she said.

"So I went to the investigation office, but he was not there. Who knows if he is being kept somewhere and forced to sign some confessions?"

(Writing by Lindsay Beck; Editing by Jeremy Laurence)