Tajik asylum seeker Parviz Zoirov, deported from France in October of this year, has been sentenced to 13 years in prison in Tajikistan. According to Radio Ozodi, citing Zoirov’s relatives, the last court hearing took place on December 12 of this year. The judge of the Ismoili Somoni district court found him guilty of extremism […]
Tajik asylum seeker Parviz Zoirov, deported from France in October of this year, has been sentenced to 13 years in prison in Tajikistan.
According to Radio Ozodi, citing Zoirov’s relatives, the last court hearing took place on December 12 of this year. The judge of the Ismoili Somoni district court found him guilty of extremism and mercenarism.
The media has not yet published Parviz’s reaction, and it is unclear under what conditions the investigation and trial took place.
Zoirov left for Lithuania through Belarus in 2022, and then moved to Germany. German law enforcement detained him at the request of Dushanbe and conducted an interview with him. Fearing extradition to Tajikistan, he traveled to France. There, he was detained again and held in isolation in Nice for 55 days before being deported to Tajikistan.
Parviz Zoirov lived in the Darvoz neighborhood in Dushanbe. This neighborhood mainly consists of residents from the village of Yazgulyam in the Darvaz district of GBAO. In March of this year, Tajik law enforcement detained more than 20 residents of this neighborhood. They were accused of extremism and inciting religious and confessional hatred. Their relatives called the accusations unfounded.
Parviz Zoirov is not the only Tajik refugee deported from European countries and subsequently convicted in Tajikistan on what are claimed to be fabricated charges leading to long prison sentences.
Previously, a similar fate befell Khizbulla Shovalizoda, deported from Austria, Abdulloh Shamsiddin, Bilol Kurbonaliyev, and Dilmurad Ergashov – all deported from Germany, Farukh Ikromov – from Poland, and Farhod Ne’matov – from Sweden. All of them were sentenced in Tajikistan to prison terms ranging from 7 to 23 years.