Kyrgyz police seize weapons from U.S. officials

By Olga Dzyubenko

BISHKEK (Reuters) - Kyrgyzstan's police raided an apartment rented by U.S. officials and seized dozens of firearms before finding out that the Americans were training Kyrgyz secret services, the government said on Tuesday.

Washington operates a military base in Kyrgyzstan to support operations in nearby Afghanistan and counts the ex-Soviet nation as a key ally in Central Asia. But their relations have been soured after a string of incidents at the base in past years.

The Interior Ministry said police had seized six machine guns, 25 assault rifles and a number of smaller firearms on Monday night from a house rented by U.S. officials. The firearms and ammunition were illegally possessed, it said.

Several embassy officials and servicemen were in the house at the time.

But the government said in a statement on Tuesday that the U.S. officials had come to train officers in the national security forces. It blamed the incident on organizational shortcomings and promised to solve the problem.

"Joint training will continue after the shortcomings are dealt with," it said in a statement.

DIPLOMATIC FRICTION

The U.S. base, established in 2001, has been the source of diplomatic friction between Washington and Kyrgyzstan since 2006 when a U.S. airman shot dead a Kyrgyz man there. The United States said at the time he was responding to a security threat.

Also that year, another U.S. officer went missing in Bishkek and appeared three days later saying she had been abducted.

Months later, a U.S. tanker jet collided with a Kyrgyz passenger plane on the runway, causing the passenger plane to make an emergency landing immediately after take-off.

Opposition activists have held a number of rallies calling on the government to evict U.S. troops but officials have resisted the calls. Kyrgyzstan also hosts a Russian airbase.

(Writing by Olzhas Auyezov, Editing by Angus MacSwan)