DUSHANBE, October 13, 2008, Asia-Plus The Prosecutor-General’s Office has solved the killing of the commander of the special police unit, Colonel Oleg Zakharchenko, the Prosecutor-General Bobojon Bobokhonov remarked at a press conference in Dushanbe today.
According to him, persons, suspected of having been involved in killing of Colonel Oleg Zakharchenko have already been identified.
However, nobody of them has been detained so far.
The chief prosecutor noted that it is still impossible to give the details of the case.
In the meantime, continuing this subject, the first deputy Tajik chief prosecutor, Abdusami Dadaboyev, noted that the case to investigate into the murder of Oleg Zakharchenko had been suspended. “Complete investigation requires a large volume of work,” said the deputy prosecutor, “However, the killers of Zakharchenko will be punished.”
As it had been reported earlier, the special police unit was attacked in Gharm, administrative center of the Rasht district on February 2 this year after it was dispatched to the Rasht district headquarters of the regional directorate for combating organized crime. Circumstances of that incident still remain unclear. According to one version, the police unit was going to arrange a meeting of the local police directorate, while according to other version, they were seeking to arrest the directorate chief Mirzokhouja Ahmadov but were fired upon by gunmen loyal to Ahmadov. The 40-year old commander of the special police unit, Oleg Zakharchenko, was killed and four policemen sustained injuries in the shoot-out.
Mirzokhouja Ahmadov was one of field commanders of the United Tajik Opposition (UTO) in the Rasht Valley during the country”s civil war in the mid-1990s but was later appointed to a senior police post as part of a broader attempt at reintegrating former rebel leaders. He headed the regional directorate for combating organized crime in the Rasht Valley till October 2, 2008. By resolution issued by the Ministry of Interiors Mahmadnazar Solehov on October 2 the Rasht regional directorate for combating organized crime has been closed down and it chief, Mirzokhouja Ahmadov is now at the disposal of the personnel department within the Ministry of Interior (MoI).
According to Ahmadov, officers from the Rasht regional directorate handed over their government-issue weapons on October 3. Ahmadov said that the directorate had had a staff of seven, including him. “We had 14 government-issue weapons, including one grenade launcher, two machine-guns, five pistols and six sub-machine-guns,” Ahmadov said, noting that he and six other officers of the directorate are currently at the disposal of the MoI personnel department. He further added that he decided to be engaged in economical activity after retirement. “The president charged local authorities to help place officers from our directorate in jobs,” Colonel Ahmadov said.
