Tajikistan holds journalist on extremism charges

ALMATY, Kazakhstan: Ex-Soviet Tajikistan says it is holding an independent journalist and government critic on extremism charges, fuelling concerns that the government is cracking down on dissent before two sets of elections.

The state prosecutor said Daler Sharipov had been detained for publishing “over 200 articles and commentaries containing extremist content” between 2013 and 2019 in a press release late on Saturday.

The release said he had also published 100 copies of a text affiliated to the Muslim Brotherhood, a movement that was banned in Tajikistan in 2006. Officials said earlier this month that more than 100 people had been arrested over ties to the brotherhood, which briefly led a government in Egypt before being overthrown in 2013 and banned. The arrests come as Tajikistan prepares to hold parliamentary elections in March and presidential elections in November. The parliamentary vote will be the first of its kind since a moderate faith-based party called the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan was banned as extremist in 2015. Sharipov became a popular figure on state television before focusing on writing for independent outlets, where he sometimes commented on the difficulties Muslims faced in observing their faith in Tajikistan. More than 90 percent of the population adheres to Islam but the government is secular and wary of the religion’s popularity.

Sharipov was beaten up in 2012 shortly after trying to set up a civic organisation devoted to fighting against regional divisions.