How we fled from the Uzbek rebellion

Promising British tennis player Richard Bloomfield today revealed how a group of top British players had to flee Uzbekistan under armed guard.

Bloomfield, 22, said the players could hear gunshots as they played in a tennis tournament in Andijan, the town at the centre of the disturbances in the central Asian republics.

The group of players - including British No4 Arvind Parmar and No5 Jamie Delgado - were escorted out of the town by soldiers as the situation deteriorated over the weekend.

Bloomfield said: "It was exciting in a way but also very scary. From where the tennis club was we could hear the gunshots but had no idea how close they were because it was surrounded by trees."

The British Embassy told them to leave as soon as possible and Bloomfield added: "We put CNN on and saw how bad it was and that we had a lucky escape.

"It was worse for our families because they were watching the events on the television. They must have been getting very worried."