DUSHANBE, May 16, 2011, Asia-Plus — Tajik national Juma Ibrohimov, who was one of 25 detainees who escaped from the pretrial detention facility run by the State Committee for national Security (SCNS) in Dushanbe last August has reportedly been killed in a gun battle with Tajik security forces in eastern Tajikistan.
Mahmadullo Asadulloyev, a spokesman for the Ministry of Interior (MoI), says Juma Ibrohimov was an activist of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan and he was sentenced to 30 years in prison in August 2010.
“Juma Ibrohimov and his accomplice, resident of Nourobod district, refused to surrender on My 15 and were killed while resisting arrest,” the Interior Ministry spokesman said. He stressed that they were not members of the gang of the militant leader Mullo Abdullo.
Of the 25 escaped inmates, four have been killed and twelve more recaptured, mostly in Dushanbe suburbs, eastern Tajikistan and Afghanistan. In Afghanistan, five of the escapees — three of whom were Afghans — were detained at the end of last year but Kabul decided to try Afghan nationals in their homeland.
We will recall that 25 convicts serving long jail terms escaped from the SCNS’s detention facility in Dushanbe in the early hours of morning of August 23 2010, killing four prison guards. Dressing in camouflage, the escapees fled toward eastern Tajikistan. The majority of the fugitives were among 46 people convicted by the Supreme Court on August 19, 2010 of terrorism, drug trafficking, and seeking the forcible overthrow of the government. The escaped prisoners include fourteen Tajik nationals, six Russian citizens, four Afghans, and two Uzbeks. Most were accused of participating in the 2009 armed rebellion in Tavildara.
Eight months after the breakout, three fugitives were killed by security forces and fourteen more have been recaptured, and the remaining eight are still at large.
