Uzbekistan autocrat Karimov's daughters expose family rift

The older daughter of Uzbekistan's President Islam Karimov has accused her sister of having ties to sorcerers, in a public row that has exposed rifts in the Central Asian ruling family.

Gulnara Karimova, who is known as a pop star and fashion designer, responded publicly after her sister, Lola Karimova-Tillyaeva, gave an interview saying they had not spoken for 12 years.

"One part of the family [our father] 'provides', but the other destroys and is friends with sorcerers," Karimova wrote on her Instagram profile. Karimova also indirectly accused her sister, who heads a charity foundation, of embezzlement.

With her striking looks and prolific postings on social networking sites, Karimova has become the best-known public face of Uzbekistan, which has been ruled by their ageing father since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

But her sister broke a long media silence last month to say the sisters had not spoken for 12 years, not even meeting even at family events.

Karimova-Tillyaeva, 35, who is Uzbekistan's permanent representative at Unesco in Paris, also suggested her older sister had little chance of succeeding their father. Gulnara Karimova, 40, runs jewellery and cosmetics businesses and some charity funds. Until recently she was Uzbekistan's permanent representative to the UN in Geneva.