DUSHANBE, September 23, 2008, Asia-Plus – The Prosecutor-General’s Office has instituted criminal proceedings against Dodojon Atovulloyev, the editor-in-chief of a Moscow-based Tajik opposition newspaper
Charoghi Rouz
(Day of Light) also leader of the Vatandor (Patriot) Movement, following an application by the Ministry of Interior (MoI), according to a MoI.
The source at the MoI said that criminal proceedings against Atovulloyev had been instituted under the provisions of several articles of Tajikistan’s Penal Code, including Article 307 (calls for overthrowing the constitutional order) and Article 137 (public defamation of the president).
The source added that Atovulloyev’s name had been put on a list of persons wanted by police.
According to unofficial sources, Dodojon Atovulloyev currently lives and works in Germany.
As it had been reported earlier, speaking to reporters in Dushanbe on July 11 this year, Tajik Prosecutor-General Bobojon Bobokhonov called Dodojon Atovulloyev “information terrorist.” According to him, living outside Tajikistan, Atovulloyev is defaming honor and dignity of the Tajik people and blackening reputation of the Tajik state in his articles and statements.
“Dodojon Atovulloyev is a person without homeland, he has never been and will never be leader,” the chief prosecutor said. He noted, “If Atovulloyev continues slanderous activity, we will have to institute criminal proceedings against him and he will be detained in any way in order to answer for that in accordance with law.”
We will recall that Dodojon Atovulloyev gave a news conference in the office of Russia’s news agency Rosbalt in Moscow on June 24, 2008.
According to Rosbalt, speaking at the press conference, Atovulloyev called to establish “real democratic system with parliament, free elections and mass media” in Tajikistan. He offered to depose the governing post-Soviet President of Tajikistan by mass actions of civil disobedience, Rosbalt reported.
Dodojon Atovulloyev accused Tajik President Emomali Rahmon in “reducing his country to poverty of the level of the poorest African countries”. He said that he headed the opposition in expulsion and had not had a possibility to visit his native Tajikistan since 2004. “Some two million Tajik nationals currently live and work in Russia. We get all information from them,” noted the
Charoghi Rouz
editor. Dodojon Atovulloyev said that he hopes that all Tajik migrant will return to Tajikistan and he will come back to Tajikistan with the last migrant and guest worker.
