DUSHANBE (Reuters) - Tajikistan said on Monday that neighbouring Uzbekistan had bombed its remote northern territory early on Sunday morning in an attack which left the impoverished former Soviet republic "bewildered" but no one hurt. Foreign ministry spokesman Igor Sattarov told a news briefing that Tajikistan, while concerned about the attack, was not ruling out a mistake on the part of Uzbekistan, adding that the bombs might have been intended for Kyrgyzstan instead. "On August 15...four planes with Uzbek air force markings, having proceeded across the Osh region of Kyrgyzstan, subjected the territory of Tajikistan to a bomb attack," Sattarov said. In the latest flareup of tensions between the squabbling states, Tajik Foreign Minister Talbak Nazarov summoned the Uzbek ambassador, Bakhtiyar Urdashev, to protest at the attack and gain assurances that it would not happen again. Uzbekistan has declined to comment on the incident. More than 100 animals died as a result of the explosions in the remote Dzhirgatal and Garmsk regions, and several hectares of agricultural land were set ablaze. "It was pure chance that the bombing did not cause loss of life," Sattarov said. A Tajik security official said earlier that the Uzbek jet fighters may have been targeting southern Kyrgyzstan around the village of Zardaly, where Uzbek nationals had been holding four Kyrgyz men hostage. The area is just 35 km (20 miles) from Tajikistan`s Dzhirgatal region. The independent daily newspaper Kyrgyz Vecherny Bishkek said Kygyrzstan had asked Uzbekistan to help it flush out the kidnappers after the captives were released late last

week. No independent confirmation was immediately available. Tajikistan, its economy in ruins after a bloody civil war between 1992 and 1997, has accused Uzbekistan, the most populous Central Asian state, of wanting to invade the mountainous republic of 5.7 million. President Imomali Rakhmonov said an uprising in northern Tajikistan led by ethnic Uzbeks among others late last year was "a thoroughly planned military aggression" supported by Uzbek leader Islam Karimov. Karimov has denied the charges, but suspects that radical fundamentalist Moslems train on Tajik territory with a view to destabilising Uzbekistan. His fear of an extremist threat was heightened in February when he narrowly avoided being killed in a series of bomb attacks in the capital Tashkent which claimed 16 lives.