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Late Tajik Deputy Defense Minister's Associates Jailed


Abduhalim Nazarzoda, former Tajik deputy defense minister (undated photo).
Abduhalim Nazarzoda, former Tajik deputy defense minister (undated photo).

Several associates of the late Deputy Defense Minister Abduhalim Nazarzoda have been imprisoned after being found guilty of attempting to seize power.

Relatives of Sadriddin Nematov and Siroj Odinaev told RFE/RL on June 13 that the two men were sentenced to life in prison by Tajikistan's Supreme Court.

Another defendant, Amrullo Nurov, was sentenced to 23 years in jail by the court.

The sentences were pronounced last week, but since the case was declared classified, the verdicts were not made public.

It is not clear how many people in the case were sentenced last week. Media reports in Tajikistan quote sources in law enforcement structures as saying that nine of Nazarzoda's associates had been sentenced.

Authorities said Nazarzoda led attacks in September on a police station and an arsenal that killed at least 26 people.

Nazarzoda was reportedly killed in an operation by government forces last year.

In May, his son, Bahtiyor Nazarov, was found guilty of public calls for mass disorder in attempting to change the country's constitutional order and for intentionally failing to report a crime.

A Dushanbe court sentenced him to 22 years in jail.

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