Tajik
Court Sentences 8 to Jail for Treason
DUSHANBE
(RIA Novosti) — A Tajik court has sentenced eight people involved
in a 1997 armed uprising to between two and 18 years in jail.
Six men were
given from 15 to 18 years on charges of coup attempts, treason,
organizing illegal border crossings and crossing the border
illegally. Two others were sentenced to two years for breaching
inviolability of residence rules.
The uprising
was led by Colonel Makhmud Khudoiberdiyev, a leader of the
People’s Front movement in the 1992-1997 civil war in the Central
Asian republic, which killed some 100,000 people. After the
war Khudoiberdiyev served in the Defense Ministry, but in August
1997 he organized an armed uprising in southern Tajikistan.
The uprising
was suppressed and Khudoberdiyev fled the country. In November
1998, he led a raid on Tajikistan, when over 100 troops and
civilians were killed. Media reports said Khudoberdiyev was
hiding in Uzbekistan after the raid. On October 11, 2001, he
was reportedly shot dead in a row with Sergei Zvorygin, his
subordinate.
Dodozhon
Ayubdzhonov, 57, received the longest jail term. A light anti-tank
weapon and three rounds to it, a Kalashnikov submachine-gun
and cartridges were found in a cache in his apartment. Ayubdzhonov
said the weapons had been given to him by the Khudoiberdiyev’s
supporters in November 1998 when they left the country, fleeing
government troops.