DUSHANBE, February4, 2016, Asia-Plus — Fifteen other Tajik nationals who are currently in China’s prisons system for drug trafficking are waiting for their fate, Tajik Foreign Minister
Sirojiddin Aslov announced at a news conference in Dushanbe on February 4.
According to him, the Tajik authorities are making attempts to organize extradition of them to Tajikistan or overturn their death sentences.
On the Tajik national who was executed in China for drug trafficking last month, Aslov noted that the Tajik MFA applied to the Chinese side twice in December asking to overturn his death sentence, “but our attempts were futile and Hasan Yusufov was executed.”
The minister called on Tajik nationals living and working abroad to observe legislation of destination country.
We will recall that Tajik national Hasan Yusufov, 51, was executed in Urumqi, the capital of China”s northwestern region of Xinjiang, early in the morning on January 28.
Tajik Embassy representatives were reportedly allowed to meet with Yusufov before his execution.
Yusufov was arrested in Urumqi in 2011 and was charged with drug trafficking. He was later found guilty and sentenced to death.
All attempts by the Tajik Embassy in Beijing to overturn the death sentence were fruitless.
Yusufov’s body was brought home to Tajikistan in the morning of February 3.
An agreement between Tajikistan and China on exchange of prisoners was signed in Dushanbe in 2014 and Tajikistan ratified it in May last year, but China has not yet ratified the agreement.
International watchdog groups note that China leads the world in executions, and drug offenders are often the ones being put to death.
