KHUJAND, July 8, 2009, Asia-Plus — Over the past decade, 84 residents of Sughd’s Isfara district have been identified as members of the outlawed Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), the Khujand prosecutor Orifjon Umarov said in an interview with Asia-Plus.
According to him, 40 of them have already been detained, 15 others have been killed in joint special operations carried out by Tajik and Kyrgyz law enforcement authorities and 29 others have been included in the list of persons wanted by police.
Since the beginning of this year, 21 IMU activists have been revealed in Isfara,” said the prosecutor, “Seven of them have been detained and 14 others have been included in the police wanted persons list.”
The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) is a militant Islamist group formed in 1998 by former Soviet paratrooper Juma Namangani and the Islamic ideologue Tohir Yuldashev both ethnic Uzbeks from the Ferghana Valley. Its objective was to overthrow President Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan, and to create an Islamic state under Sharia.
In 1999 and 2000, the IMU launched a series of raids into southern Kyrgyzstan. However, in 2001 the IMU was largely destroyed while fighting alongside the Taliban against United States
-led coalition forces in Afghanistan. Namangani was killed, and the IMU”s remaining fighters were dispersed. Yuldashev and an unknown number of fighters escaped with remnants of the Taliban to Waziristan in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan.
