November 5, 2002

TAJIK MILITARY RETALIATES AGAINST JOURNALISTS BY DRAFTING THEM INTO ARMY

Military officials in Tajikistan have forcibly conscripted three journalists into the army following the trio’s involvement in the production of a television program that detailed the use of "press-gangs" to fulfill draft quotas. Human rights groups and media advocacy organizations have denounced the action by the military commissariat in Khujand, the main urban center in northern Tajikistan. Meanwhile, US and German diplomats have indicated they will raise the incident with the Tajik Foreign Ministry.

The incident began on October 28, when officers from the Khujand military commissariat took nine journalists from two television stations – SM-1 and TRK-Asia – into custody. All nine were participants in a 10-day journalist-training workshop organized by Internews, a US-based non-profit group that promotes open media around the world. Six were eventually released because they qualified for draft exemptions, including that accorded to fathers of more than two children. The three forcibly conscripted have been identified as Akram Azizov, 21; Nasim Rahimov, 20; and Yusuf Yunusov, 21. Both Azizov and Rahimov are affiliated with the SM-1 television channel. Yunusov works for TRK-Asia.

"The arrest and forced conscription in Khujand highlights the ongoing vulnerability that Tajik journalists face in retaliation from government officials for their reporting," said Alex Lupis, the Europe & Central Asia program coordinator for the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). "President Imomali Rakhmonov must ensure that these journalists are released immediately and the military officers involved are investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law."

As part of the Internews-sponsored workshop the journalists produced programming broadcast on SM-1. On October 24, they produced and broadcast a report on the aggressive tactics used by local military authorities to fulfill draft quotas. The program also featured Fazliddin Domonov, a top military official in Khujand, who denied that so-called press-gangs were used to round up draft-eligible youths in and around the city. During the same broadcast, secretly taped footage depicted several youths who were forcibly taken into custody and who were awaiting medical exams at an induction center. One of the youths showed a document that purported to be a medical exemption, saying that authorities had not recognized the validity of the letter. Later in the program, local citizens in interviews complained about the military’s heavy-handed enforcement of the draft.

Domonov reportedly grew irate over the program, and witnesses say he threatened the journalists as he left the studio. The next day he allegedly called the station and threatened to punish the staff with forced conscription. On October 28 – a Monday – the arrests occurred. Observers note that recruits rounded up during the previous week are routinely dispatched to military bases on Mondays. They add that the timing of the military’s action appeared designed to limit the ability of human rights groups and journalist organizations to mount protests against the forced conscriptions.

The three journalists are reportedly now at Khujand’s military base. Media rights advocates contend that Khujand military officials have no right to conscript the trio, who are all originally from the Sughd region, outside the city’s jurisdiction. Under the country’s legal framework, the trio should be drafted only by authorities in their home communities.

Internews has protested the military’s action, and appealed to the mayor of Khujand to intervene. The organization is also seeking the intervention of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Meanwhile, Nuriddin Qarshiboyev, head of the Tajik Association for Independent Broadcasters, characterized the incident as "pressure on the freedom of speech using incorrect methods inadmissible in a democratic society."

"Such [forcible] actions by uniformed military personnel to conscript young people into the armed service are inadmissible because they comprise flagrant violations of people’s civil rights," Qarshiboyev told the Asia-Plus news agency.