Women’s clothes are high on the government’s agenda once again in Tajikistan, where authorities and Islamic leaders are working on new guidelines on what women should wear to work and during their leisure time.

The new dress code — the second of its kind in six years — is expected to be made public in the coming days, and a special event is reportedly being planned for the capital, Dushanbe, in August to showcase compliant clothes.

Sulaimon Davlatzoda, the head of the state Committee for Religious Affairs and the Regulation of Traditions, told a press briefing in the capital this week that “a joint task force of the Culture Ministry, the Women’s Committee, and the Religious Affairs Committee is working together to determine what clothes are most compatible with our national values and traditions.”

The new dress code comes after Tajikistan officially issued a ban in June on “clothes alien to Tajik culture,” a term widely used by officials to describe Islamic dress, which they treat as an outward sign of potential religious extremism.

Earlier this week, the Central Asian country’s state-backed Islamic Council of Ulema issued a fatwa — a religious edict — against “black clothes” as well as “tight-fitting and see-through” garments for women. In Tajikistan, the term “black clothes” tends to be a euphemism for the Islamic hijab.

The July 26 fatwa proclaimed that the color of black is not compatible with “our national and geographical characteristics.”

Echoing the government’s long-standing position on female clothing, the fatwa also promoted a national costume for Tajik women, which consists of a dress, trousers, and a kerchief.

The fatwa explained that the three-piece was fully in line with the Islamic practice mandating a woman cover her entire body, with the exception of her face, hands, and feet.

‘We Got The Message’

Tajik President Emomali Rahmon, who has been in power for more than 30 years, has been criticized by rights groups for clamping down on independent media, political pluralism, and also religious freedom. Religious beliefs and practices that deviate from the state-mandated norm are often seen by the authorities as a threat to Tajikistan’s stability and security.

Tajiks, especially those who wear the hijab, say they believe that the June hijab ban, the latest fatwa, and the upcoming guidelines on women’s clothing are a “needless, excessive step.”

“Black was already banned,” said Munisa, a nurse in a state hospital in a northern city who didn’t want to give her full name. She was referring to the state Religious Committee’s 2017 statement that prohibited wearing black at funerals.

Instead, the statement urged Tajik women to stick to the local tradition of wearing blue to mourn their dead.

“Nothing is new about the hijab ban, either. It’s been [effectively] in place for a decade at least,” Munisa said.

“We got the message already. There’s no need to keep repeating it, with new laws,” the 40-year-old nurse said.

Like many Tajiks, Munisa dismisses the fatwa against tight and see-through dresses as a smokescreen, saying the real target is Islamic dress, which the government considers “alien” and a threat to the secular government. For example, previous bans on miniskirts and plunging necklines have never been enforced.

In predominantly Muslim Tajikistan, a country of nearly 10 million people, the authorities’ campaign against the Islamic head scarf began in 2007 when the Education Ministry prohibited the hijab — and miniskirts — at schools and universities.

The ban eventually expanded to workplaces, and officials and police conducted raids to ensure its compliance.

Many hijab-wearing women faced a tough choice between their religious and cultural beliefs and their careers. Some quit their jobs or studies, while others — like Munisa — swapped their Islamic head scarf for the traditional kerchief.

Tajik men have also fallen afoul of government edicts in the past, with the authorities seeing them as suspect because of their long or bushy beards.

In 2015, a regional police chief in the southern Khatlon Province announced that nearly 13,000 men “with long and unkempt beards” were rounded up in the streets and bazaars over the course of the year and had their beards “brought to order.”

A high-ranking government official warned Tajik bloggers in 2023 that promoting beards might be interpreted as “an expression of solidarity with terrorist groups” and presents “a threat to national security.”

In 2018, the Culture Ministry published The Guidebook To Recommended Outfits In Tajikistan, which outlines acceptable designs, colors, and fabrics for clothing.

While the guidebook encouraged women to wear the Tajik national three-piece costume, for the office it suggested that they wear Western-style clothes, albeit with more modest necklines and hemlines.

It is not clear if the upcoming dress code will supersede the previous guideline.

New Crackdown

Some Dushanbe residents have complained that the recent official ban on “alien” clothes has prompted the authorities to crack down.

In Dushanbe, a group of hijab-wearing women were rounded up on May 22 by law enforcement officers and representatives of the local women’s affairs office and taken to the police station.

One of the women later told RFE/RL’s Tajik Service that their fingerprints and mugshots were taken and they were made to promise not to wear “alien” clothes ever again, before being released the same day.

On May 23, police in the capital’s Shohmansur district briefly detained 13 men with bushy beards and demanded that they shave. Police warned them they “will be arrested if caught again with long beards,” one of the men told RFE/RL.

Source

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Speculations over what American foreign policy under the potential leadership of Kamala Devi Harris might look like have begun in earnest, now that US president Joe Biden – who announced recently that he would not be seeking re-election – has officially endorsed his vice president as his heir apparent in the race for the presidency. Although many Democratic Party leaders and supporters have joined the president in coalescing behind Harris, the official nominee of the Democrats will only be chosen at their party’s national convention in Chicago next month.

Should Kamala Harris, if confirmed as the Democrats’ standard bearer, triumph over Donald Trump when Americans take to the ballot box this November, what can we expect from the foreign policy of a Harris administration towards the Indo-Pacific region? Would she prove a “weak” leader – as Beijing’s state-backed news outlet Global Times has insisted – whose presidency is unlikely to pose a threat to China?

Shaky Start

Having carved a niche as the state of California’s top law enforcement official and subsequently its junior senator, Harris stepped into the vice presidency with little foreign policy experience. Her initial foray into US diplomacy began with a stumble: her proposal to work with Central American nations to address the root causes of illegal immigration into the United States was quickly lumped with the related issue of the security of America’s southern border, which she – as in the case of a clumsy interview with the US news outlet NBC News – tried unsuccessfully to avoid. Nor did the initial turmoil among her staff do her reputation any favours.

However, things have markedly improved since those rough beginnings, with seasoned Washington operators like Philip Gordon and Rebecca Lissner being enlisted to advise the vice president on foreign policy and national security matters. According to US congressman Adam Smith, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, Harris’s performance at this year’s Munich Security Conference making a case for America’s role in Ukraine and NATO indicates that she has been “stress-tested” and found credible.

Staying the Course

Given her inexperience as an international leader, it is highly likely that Harris, as US president, would continue the Biden administration’s foreign policy, at least until such time as she has a firmer grasp on world affairs. Under her leadership, the United States is likely to continue supporting Ukraine and NATO while adopting a firm line against Vladimir Putin and Russia. Given her strong stance against Israel’s handling of the Gaza conflict – which she has referred to as a humanitarian catastrophe for innocent civilians – it is possible that her Israel policy may prove less fixed and intransigent than Biden’s. Indeed, she is on record for having called for a “temporary ceasefire” to the Gaza conflict well before her boss publicly did.

But far as the Indo-Pacific goes, it is unlikely that Harris would stray from extant US policy. As noted, many Chinese seem to think that Harris would prove weaker than Biden in dealing with China. As a US senator, she co-sponsored a bill promoting human rights in Hong Kong and supported another on the rights of Uyghurs in Xinjiang; in both cases, the bills included sanctions against those deemed responsible for human rights abuses.

China

As vice president, Harris has underscored America’s support – “consistent with [the US’s] long-standing policy” – for Taiwan’s self-defence and decried Chinese intimidation and coercion against Philippine vessels in the waters surrounding the Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea.

In an interview with CBS News last year, Harris advocated a firm stance against China, calling for “de-risking” from Beijing – a policy that aims to reduce the extent to which the US and Western economies depend on China. “It’s not about pulling out [from China], but it is about ensuring that we are protecting American interests, and that we are a leader in terms of the rules of the road, as opposed to following others’ rules”, Harris explained in that interview.

Harris’s remarks on China strongly hint at the influence of Rebecca Lissner, who currently serves as deputy national security adviser to the vice president. In her 2020 book An Open World: How America Can Win the Contest for Twenty-First-Century Order (co-authored with Mira Rapp-Hooper), Lissner argues that China constitutes America’s “chief antagonist” to an open world through Beijing’s determined efforts at forming exclusive territorial and technological blocs. Against such opposition, Lissner advocates a new vision and approach for America, one that allows it to de-risk itself while working with like-minded allies and rebuilding what she considers outmoded international institutions to set rules that ensure and enhance global openness. Lissner is adamant that the United States and the West should not pursue regime change around the world, but counter authoritarian competitors by preventing the rise of closed spheres of influence and preserving open access to the global commons.

Such an openness strategy is also in line with Harris’s criticism of the Trump administration’s inconsequential efforts to engage North Korea and rein in its nuclear ambitions, which do not close Northeast Asia off as much as create undue uncertainty and apprehension in the region. This is not to imply that Lissner’s ideas would form the blueprint for foreign policy under a Harris administration. At the very least, it suggests that Beijing’s hopes of a weak and unfocused America under Harris may be premature, perhaps even unfounded.

ASEAN

Under Harris, the United States is also likely to stay the course taken by Biden in its ties with ASEAN and Southeast Asia, a region hotly contested by both Beijing and Washington. But whether Harris would do better than Biden at reassuring and improving the region’s perceptions of America remains to be seen. According to a 2024 annual survey conducted by the ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute, when asked who they would prefer to align with in the ongoing China-US rivalry, slightly more Southeast Asian respondents reportedly sided with the Chinese (50.5%) than with the Americans (49.5%). That said, a Harris-led America would presumably play the kind of international leadership role ASEAN desires of the United States than a Trump-led one is likely to furnish. While ASEAN leaders would no doubt redouble their efforts to keep a mercurial and capricious Donald Trump happy and engaged (were he to return as US leader), a President Harris is more likely to show up for ASEAN meetings in person – the high-mark of ASEAN summitry success – than a President Trump ever did or would.

Southeast Asians have had a couple of opportunities to see Kamala Harris up close. At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in August 2021, Harris, in her capacity as US vice president, visited Singapore and Vietnam to strengthen her nation’s security partnerships and to expand economic cooperation with two of America’s critical Indo-Pacific partners. Attending the 2023 ASEAN summit held in Jakarta in Biden’s stead, Harris – in her fifth visit to the Southeast Asian region – engaged with leaders of the ASEAN member states as well as Australia, China, Japan and South Korea. Notably, as a senator, Harris was active in legislating against human rights abuses in Myanmar – a concern she has repeatedly raised during her visits to Southeast Asia. Welcomed or otherwise, ASEAN could expect a greater focus on Myanmar from a Harris administration than it ever did from the Biden – and, for that matter, the Trump – administrations.

Conclusion

Should a Harris foreign policy adopt the contours and course of a grand strategy akin to what Lissner has counselled, it would probably surprise no one if China – still designated as America’s chief antagonist – were to resume its age-old accusation against America over the latter’s ostensible “Cold War” fixation with alliances and partnerships aimed at (in Beijing’s view) encircling and counterbalancing China. In this regard, it is unclear whether Harris might tap into her part-Indian heritage – her late mother was from Tamil Nadu – to enlist India (as a member of the Quad) in checking an assertive China: she has come across as ambivalent towards India. All things considered, the prospect of a Harris presidency is not the worst thing that could happen for the Indo-Pacific region.

See Seng Tan is President and CEO of International Students Inc. (ISI) in the United States and concurrently Research Adviser at RSIS and Senior Associate at the Centre for Liberal Arts and Social Sciences (CLASS) at NTU.

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Brussels, Frankfurt (10/11 -12)

Words like ‘neocolonialism’ and ‘neo-imperialists’ are being tossed around by spokesmen of freshly-installed military regimes in Central and West Africa – but the language of their pronouncements is French, reflecting the centuries of invasion, cooperation, exploitation and alliance of France in the Sahel.

Commonly referred to as ‘Francophone Africa’, the jigsaw puzzle of countries have in quite recent times seen a dramatic shift of power, and one not in its favor. Traditional cozy relationships with decades-long dictatorships – ostensibly democracies but controlled and corrupt in a heads-I-win-and-tails-you-lose elite pageantry are under serious siege.

Look at hapless, raggedy-ass Francophone Africa, all of whose republics, independent since the 1960s, are still exploited merrily by the former colonial power, through comprador governments and military force.

Here’s Niger, the vast landlocked West African nation with prodigious quantities of uranium buried and ready to be mined; at ~$9,000/ton, uranium ore is spectacularly more precious even than gold ore (~$1,600/ton). The energy policy of the French Republic is heavily committed to nuclear power (because they are realists) so they are in urgent need of that tasty Nigerien ore.

And the average Nigerien? He or she sees next to nothing of the wealth, as it flows abroad: only 17% of the nation has access to electrical mains power; per capita GDP in Niger was last recorded at 545.46 US dollars in 2022. To drive home that point, the average Nigerien family takes home around US$ 45/month, in a land of massive natural riches. Now does it not make sense that the average educated inhabitant of this hemmed-in West African nation is dissatisfied with their compromised, crooked rulers, after six decades of independence?

When the era of direct colonial rule in the Francophone nations of Central and West Africa gave way to independence and a form of democratic rule, both of these noble concepts were compromised by a desperate economic plight and the smooth formation of a tight military-backed band of elite thieves.

Comprador regimes tightly linked to French companies and government agencies ensured that the wealth of the country would end up in their pockets – actually the bulging purses of beaming, obliging Swiss, French and British bankers.

Take Niger: how do you run a representative democracy when the literacy rate of the people – hungry and frequently ill, most of them – is just 17%? Infant mortality, dramatically improved since 1960, still sits at 10%. It is a sad and unfunny joke, in a landlocked country 80% of which extends across the hostile Sahara.

Eventually the military figured out they were getting screwed (along with everyone else not “connected” to the power elite). Boom – boom – boom! Seven military coups have walloped Francophone Africa since August 2020: Niger (July 2023), Burkina Faso (January and September 2022), Sudan (October 2021), Guinea (September 2021) and Mali (August 2020 and May 2021). Sacre bleu! Mon Dieu!

Average people were sick and tired of seeing their corrupt elites sucking wealth out of the country, while they shamefully lived in desperate conditions.

Look at the evil Mobuto Sese Seko, dictator of Zaire from 1965 ~ 1997: between $5~15 billion stolen and squirreled away in happy Swiss banks… luxurious Euro-properties, private jets, a collection of expensive cars… a $4 million vacation home at Cap Martin on the Mediterranean coast of France… an apartment on the upscale Avenue Foch in Paris, and on and on. While his country suffered 30% child mortality, surviving children grew up stunted and thin with rickets. “Foreign friends” did not care, because monster Mobutu was <pause for effect> an “anti-Communist”, butthole-buddies with Presidents Kennedy, Nixon, Reagan, and George H. W. Bush.

The United States was the third largest donor of aid to Zaire (after Belgium and France), holding its nose and ignoring his detestable human rights crimes.

Fast-forward to 2023. The freshly-installed military-backed regimes in Francophone Africa now find themselves in the same quandary as the little boy who prayed and prayed for a volcano: he got one. Beset with fanatic Islamist insurgency, well-funded by the nasty oil-autocracies of the Arab crescent and fearful that they too might get the chop from another clique of their own military, they turn to … surprise! Russia and China, now obligingly making their presence known throughout Francophone Africa, ready to do business. The Wagner Group is laying out counter-insurgency strategy with Niger and neighboring nations; the People’s Republic of China is lathering money on hospitals, bridges, railroads and other infrastructure – without superior lectures on gender rights or democratic theater.

Neither Russia nor China is burdened with the poisonous heritage of colonial rule; neither were slavers or hand-choppers or oppressors of the natives. That is certainly in their favor. Europe may have “apologized” for the naughty behavior of elite brutes like German colonials, who are remembered for the Herero and Nama genocide, which occurred between 1904 and 1908 in German South West Africa (modern-day Namibia), along with massive forced labor and oppression. The fearsome Mau Mau Uprising in Kenya engendered retaliation with massive human rights abuses by the polite, civilized British colonial rulers.

Russia and China have their own sorry history of oppression, but not in Africa – and that is to their credit, as far as the fresh military regimes now in power are concerned.

“Who’s going to rape me next?” the continent asks cheerfully.

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The poignant tale of one life lost but not forgotten.

Zimbabwe was not allowed to join the wreath-laying ceremony held at the Cenotaph in London on Sunday in memory of soldiers who lost their lives in World War I and World War II.

Thirty-four thousand soldiers of all races from Southern Rhodesia served during the two world wars; 800 died in World War I and 916 in World War II.

This poignant little tale today is in remembrance of one soldier. We may not be there to show him respect but he and the 1 716 others are not forgotten.

Ralph met and was smitten with Barbara when they were both at Umtali High School (now Mutare) in the 1930s. He was three years older than her and left school to join the Civil Service Treasury Department. Barbara went to university in South Africa and contact between the two was lost until war broke out in 1939.

When Barbara returned from university she underwent a month’s military training and found out that Ralph had also enlisted. Before long, Ralph had tracked her down; she was living in Sacs House, a women’s residence in Salisbury (now Harare), and one afternoon received a phone call out of the blue from Ralph.

He invited her to a picnic on the Hunyani River. Ralph was very tall, 6’5″, but was also painfully shy. He asked Barbara to watch for him from the window and come out when she saw a red two-seater car arrive. Barbara laughingly agreed and from that picnic on, the school sweethearts were destined to be together.

Little else is known of Ralph Lenton. His war records show that he served in Uganda and the Middle East, had been in Kenya and Madagascar, and in 1943 had learnt to speak Swahili fluently.

Ralph and Barbara were married when the young captain came home on leave in early 1944. They went on honeymoon by train to the Victoria Falls where they spent one idyllic week. Returning to Salisbury they spent another fortnight together before Ralph was called back to duty.

Captain Ralph Lenton of the East African Artillery (Royal Artillery Regiment) was reported missing at sea on Saturday the 12th of February 1944.

Sailing on the 6th February 1944 from Kilindini Harbour in Mombasa (Kenya) to Colombo in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in convoy, the SS Khedive Ismail.

The ship was hit by two torpedoes; 1 297 people perished. Lenton was 25 at the time of his death.

His wife of one month was 22. I met Barbara 60 years later. She has never remarried. She said she came close two or three times but that it never “felt right, as it did with Ralph”.

Barbara had four black and white photographs of her beloved Ralph, three in army uniform, the fourth showing a dashing and tall young man in shorts and casual shirt, smiling shyly in the African bush. When Barbara was 87 she told me that every morning she looks at that photograph and says: “Hello sweetheart.”

The story of Ralph Lenton is of a life lost, but not forgotten, and now, whoever who reads this column will also know it.

One day we hope that we too will be there at the Cenotaph to remember Ralph Lenton and the 1 716 men of all races from Southern Rhodesia who gave their lives.

Source: Money Web

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Frankfurt (22/09 – 58.33)

Since May 2022, the Tajikistani authorities have stepped up their ongoing crackdown on Pamiris, an ethnic, linguistic and religious minority originating from the Pamir mountains in Gorno Badakhshan Autonomous Oblast of Tajikistan. They have arbitrarily detained hundreds of Pamiris, including civil society activists and human rights defenders, and imprisoned over 200 of them after convictions in unfair trials, in a campaign aimed at stripping the local communities of their leadership and dismantling their civil society. 

The authorities must immediately and unconditionally release Pamiri civil society activists, journalists and human rights defenders who have been detained solely for exercising their rights to freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly. They must effectively investigate allegations of torture and other ill-treatment of people in custody. They must cease denying the Pamiris the rights to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practice their own religion, and to use their own languages.

Tajikistan authorities have arbitrarily detained hundreds of Pamiris, including civil society activists and human rights defenders, and imprisoned over 200 of them after convictions in unfair trials, in a campaign aimed at stripping the local communities of their leadership and dismantling their civil society.

Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Oblast (GBAO) is a high mountain region in the east of Tajikistan and officially had a population of 236,000 in 2018. The de jure autonomy of the region is enshrined in Art. 81-83 of Tajikistan’s Constitution, which entitles it to a local legislature merely with “the right of legislative initiative” and unspecified “powers … in social, economic, [and] cultural spheres of life … determined by a constitutional law”. Most of its ipopulation identify as ethnic Pamiris and adhere to the Ismaili branch of Shia Islam. They form ethnic, linguistic and religious minorities in the country. However, they are not recognized as ethnic and linguistic minorities by the state. The central authorities have been increasingly suppressing the use of Pamiri languages and the assertion of Pamiri identity in state institutions, schools, the media, artistic performances and public spaces, in violation of the right of minorities “to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practise their own religion, [and] to use their own language” enshrined in Art. 27 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. They have also asserted tight state control over Ismaili religious practice like collective prayers and severely restricted religious freedom.

May 2022 and Ongoing Crackdown Against Pamiri Minority

Since May 2022, the Tajikistani authorities have stepped up their efforts to remove all vestiges of actual autonomy of the region and a crackdown on civil society in GBAO, violently dispersing protest events that were overwhelmingly peaceful or started as peaceful prior to their violent dispersal by government forces, and arbitrarily detaining individuals who disposed of informal authority or local influence, including civil society activists, journalists and human rights defenders. As well, they targeted individuals who had attempted to exercise their rights to freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association by publicly voicing dissent in the context of protest events and in social media anytime in the past. According to a statement by the Inter-Agency Committee on Enforcement of Law and Order in GBAO on 17 June 2022, 220 persons had been detained in the framework of the so-called “special operation” which had started in mid-May 2022. Dozens or hundreds of further individuals were detained before and after the most intense phase of the crackdown. The news portal Pamir Inside (previously Pamir Daily News) listed the names of 205 convicted individuals in June 2023 whose cases had been made public or whose relatives had agreed to make public. Short-term arbitrary detention, including officially unacknowledged custody, for instance for the purpose of interrogation, was a mass phenomenon during the crackdown in May-June 2022 and has continued on a lesser scale since then. 

For example, one Pamiri man was detained by the State Committee for National Security (SCNS) during the most intense phase of the crackdown in summer 2022. He was taken to an SNCS office and interrogated about the protests in which he had taken part, and about community leaders and civil society activists with whom he was acquainted. The interrogating officer beat him, insulted him and denigrated him because of his ethnic and religious identity. After several hours, he was released. Shortly afterwards, he was summoned for interrogation by the Office of the Prosecutor. Once again, he was insulted and denigrated, but this time there was no physical violence. After a few weeks, he was interrogated once more by the SCNS. He left the country, fearing that one of the security agencies could detain and prosecute him anytime. 

Respected community figures among the Pamiri diaspora, political activists and other dissenters were forcibly returned or secretly renditioned from the Russian Federation in cooperation with Russian security services, and detained immediately after arrival in Tajikistan. In the months following May 2022, many Pamiris in Russia who expressed political dissent or volunteered in the framework of community activities of the Pamiri diaspora, were informally threatened with forcible return by members of the Tajikistani or Russian security services. Many Pamiri refugees have been at risk of deportation from a number of countries in Europe and elsewhere where they were seeking international protection. Back in Tajikistan, many family members of Pamiri refugees have been repeatedly visited by and threatened by the Tajik security services about the whereabouts of their family members overseas. Countries forcibly returning Pamiris to Tajikistan are breaching the principle of non-refoulement, a cornerstone of international human rights and refugee law, which prohibits the transfer of anyone to a place where they could be exposed to persecution or other serious human rights violations. Pamiris forcibly returned to Tajikistan are at risk of arbitrary detention, torture and other ill-treatment, enforced disappearance and unfair trials. 

The risks for Tajikistani citizens targeted by the authorities and forcibly returned to Tajikistan are evident in the case of Abdullohi Shamsiddin. In spite of multiple warnings about the risk of detention and torture in Tajikistan, on 18 January 2023, Germany deported him to Tajikistan. He is an ethnic Tajik and closely related to several leaders of the oppositional Party of Islamic Revival of Tajikistan. After arrival in Tajikistan, he was subjected to enforced disappearance and then reportedly held in solitary confinement by the SCNS. On 29 March 2023, a court in Dushanbe reportedly convicted Abdullohi Shamsiddin on charges of “public calls for the violent change of the constitutional order of the Republic of Tajikistan” under Article 307 of the Criminal Code and sentenced him to seven years in prison. 

Amnesty International has conducted interviews with two individuals who had been interrogated by various security agencies during or after the crackdown in May 2022 but were not arrested and could leave the country, and with five individuals who had been detained or interrogated before May 2022. Almost all interlocutors, who spoke on conditions of strict anonymity, reported verbal abuse during interrogation which did not only target the interrogated person, but also their female relatives, ethnic Pamiris and their Ismaili religious community. Many interlocutors reported physical violence during interrogation as well, includ beating with fists, batons and metallic devices, electric shocks and sleep deprivation. According to interlocutors who had been subjected to torture and other ill-treatment, it had mostly been aimed at extracting information from them and forcing them to incriminate themselves and others. With few exceptions, those who were arbitrarily arrested and officially remanded in detention during and after the crackdown in May 2022 were convicted in unfair trials, many of them under unfounded charges of participating in organized criminal groups (Art. 187 of the Criminal Code15). The Law of the Republic of Tajikistan on Combating Terrorism (Art. 4) defines crimes under Art. 187 of the Criminal Code as crimes of “terrorist” character and in such cases allows closed trials (Art. 18). UN experts have recently expressed concern about the potential negative impact of this overly broad definition of terrorism on due process. 

Pamiris detained during and after the crackdown in May 2022 were often convicted in such closed trials and in many cases did not have access to a lawyer. In particular, the trials of human rights defenders were described as unfair by many observers, as no evidence of credible charges was publicly presented. Sentences were extraordinarily harsh, which is reflected in the high number (11) of sentences to life imprisonment. UN experts have addressed the cases of human rights defenders Ulfatkhonim Mamadshoeva, Manuchekhr Kholiknazarov, Faromuz Irgashov and Khushruz Jumaev.

For example, Commission 44 was an informal group of individuals formed in November 2021 in Khorugh to monitor the investigation into an alleged extra-judicial execution and lethal violence against protesters and to intermediate between the authorities and the population in GBAO. Several respected Pamiri lawyers and civil society representatives joined Commission 44. During the May 2022 crackdown, its most prominent members were arbitrarily detained. They were convicted and sentenced after the Supreme Court of Tajikistan arbitrarily labelled Commission 44 a “criminal organization”. Faromuz Irgashov, a lawyer who had tried to register as a non-party candidate for the 2020 presidential elections, was sentenced to 29 years in prison for alleged participation in a criminal group, murder, terrorism and organization of activities of an extremist organization. Manuchehr Kholiknazarov, also a lawyer, the director of the Lawyers Association of Pamir and a member of the NGO Coalition against Torture and Impunity in Tajikistan, was sentenced to 16 years in prison for alleged participation in a criminal group and organization of activities of an extremist organization; and the Lawyers Association of Pamir was closed by the authorities for alleged links to organized criminal groups. Addressing the alleged arbitrary detention of Irgashov, Kholiknazarov and others, UN experts in a joint communication to the Government of Tajikistan in May 2023 expressed “serious concerns about the apparent pattern of using extremism- and terrorism-related charges against human rights defenders and minority activists, particularly those defending the rights of the Pamiri minority, allegedly to discredit them and justify further secrecy around their cases.” 

Several international non-governmental organizations, including Human Rights Watch, the International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR), CIVICUS and others, have called for Kholiknazarov’s immediate and unconditional realease, raising concerns about the sharp deterioration of the environment for human rights defenders and civil society activists in recent years.

Recommendations The Tajikistani authorities must respect the human rights of all persons in Tajikistan, and in particular end immediately reprisals against Pamiri activists and other dissenting voices. All Pamiri human rights defenders, other civil society activists, journalists, community leaders and others, who have been arbitrarily detained and imprisoned solely for exercising their rights to freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly, must be immediately and unconditionally released.

All allegations of torture and other ill-treatment of people in custody must be effectively investigated, and all suspects must be brought to account in fair trial proceedings. All victims of human rights violations in Tajikistan should receive full and adequate reparations for the damage suffered. 

Members of the Pamiri communities should be able to fully enjoy their economic, social and cultural, as well as civil and political rights. 

The reported widespread discrimination against Pamiris, particularly in the criminal justice system, must be effectively, independently and impartially investigated. All laws, policies and practices that may be discriminatory should be independently examined, and all necessary measures taken to ensure that these are fully compliant with Tajikistan’s international human rights obligations, including by repealing or amending the relevant legislation, abolishing relevant policies and ending relevant practices, and monitoring the actions of state officials. All victims of discrimination should have access to effective, transparent and accessible remedies. 

The international community should monitor and report on human rights violations in Tajikistan, including in GBAO. International and regional organizations and Tajikistan’s other international partners, including national governments, should raise these violations at every opportunity, including in multi- and bi-lateral fora, and actively seek an end to these violations and take steps to provide remedy for their victims. 

All states should respect the principle of non-refoulement and must not forcibly returning individuals from GBAO to Tajikistan or to any third country such as Russia, where they would be at risk of forcible transfer to Tajikistan, where in turn they could be victims of human rights violations, including arbitrary arrest and prosecution, torture and other ill-treatment, and unfair trials.

Source: Amnesty International

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New York, Brussels (21/12 – 60).

Human rights violation committed by Tajikistan state security officials breeding an atmosphere of fear and oppression was the verdict of a United Nations human rights mission conducted by Special Rapporteur Mary Lawlor, after a recent visit to the country earlier this month. She described the situation of human rights defenders in Tajikistan as an atmosphere of corruption and the fear of persecution. She called on the government to treat human rights defenders as allies, not opponents.

There is a violent repression of the ethnic and religious minority – Pamir Ismailis – and it has been going on for a year in Gorny Badakhshan. American experts call President Rahmon’s policy towards the Pamirs a genocide.  

Tajikistan is the poorest republic of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), where human rights defenders – from lawyers to journalists and activists – are under the brutal pressure of the authoritarian leader Emomali Rahmon, who has ruled the country for more than 30 years forever. According to American experts, the Tajik authorities are in a deep political crisis. In addition to the occasional outbreaks of armed violence on the border with Kyrgyzstan, Gorny Badakhshan has been witnessing a year of brutal repression of the Pamir Ismailis, an ethnic and religious minority. American experts emphasize that President Rahmon’s policy towards the Pamiri is a crime against humanity that, if unchecked, could escalate into genocide. 

Russian security services arrested and forcibly extradited to Tajikistan more than 20 activists of the Pamir community in Moscow, some of whom had Russian passports. Dr. Suzanne Levi-Sanchez, Professor of Law at Harvard University (Visiting Scholar at the Harvard University’s Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies), claims that the detainees are at least 160: They arrested all informal leaders of civil society: journalists, human rights defenders, lawyers, businessmen. More than 40 people were tortured. 

During the 30 years of Emomali Rahmon’s autocratic rule, the Pamir remained a territory where the people actively protested against the arbitrariness of the authorities. In 2012, security agencies and the army were used to suppress protests in Khorog – the center of the Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Region – resulting in the killing of seventeen servicemen and more than 30 residents, whom the Tajik authorities called «terrorists» and «separatists». Panellists at the Davis Center at Garvada University stressed that the current repression of Pamiri is even more severe than in 2012. 

United Nations Human Rights mission reported Tajikistan to be an atmosphere of corruption and the fear of persecution amongst the people. Ms Mary Lawlor called on the Tajikistan government to treat human rights defenders as allies, not opponents.

“I want to emphasize that during the protests in Gorny Badakhshan no one called for independence. They are not separatists. They did not have such a goal. I have spoken to many people from there, and they say: we agree to be part of Tajikistan. It is obvious that the initiators of [violence] were the security forces, which used tear gas and flashbangs against the crowd” emphasized Bruce Pannier, a Central Asia Analyst, publicist and presenter for Radio Liberty.

Human rights activist Steve Swerdlow described the state campaign launched by President Rakhmon against Pamiri as a crime against humanity. He expressed concern that it might become a real genocide of an ethnic minority. 

Above: University of Oxford Podcasts, Asian Studies Centre – Steve Swerdlow, Neil Clarke, Syinat Sultanalieva discuss human rights violations in Tajikistan, chaired by Faisal Devji.

“What we saw this summer was part of a campaign of cultural assimilation, suppression of religious beliefs and language. All these facts point to crimes against humanity. We do not need to prove that Rahmon wants to erase the Pamir identity. This is evident when compared to similar examples in other countries, such as the situation in Western Ethiopian Tigray, the Uighur situation in Chinese Seung-jiang, or the activities of pro-government militias in Darfur. The practice of arrest, violence and murder is escalating. This is a matter of concern. It is for these reasons that it should be called crimes against humanity, because there is a real risk that the situation will get out of control and turn into genocide”, said Steve Swerdlow, an Associate Professor University of Southern California. 

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