DUSHANBE, May 16, 2013, Asia-Plus – Tourabek Okhounov, the acting director of Tajikistan’s largest real estate development company, Movarounnahr, has reportedly been taken to the State Committee for Nationals Security (SCNS)’s office for Dushanbe.
“Tourabek Okhounov, the acting director of Movarounnahr was taken to SCNS’s office for Dushanbe today,” Buzurgmehr Yorov, an accredited representative of Movarounnahr told Asia-Plus in an interview on May 16.
According to him, the reasons for detention of Tourabek Okhounov are still unknown. “His lawyer, Ms. Tamanno Ashourova, was not allowed to accompany him,” Yorov said.
For her part, Ms. Ashourova supposed that security officers would like to talk to him about the upcoming demonstration.
On May 14, customers of Movarounnahr applied to the Dushanbe mayor’s office for permission to hold a demonstration outside the parliament building on June 3.
“On May 15, Tourabek Okhounov was summoned to the police station in Dushanbe’s Sino district and according to him, they demanded that he dissuade Movarounnahr’s customers from holding the demonstration outside the parliament building,” the lawyer noted.
She added Tourabek Okhounov cannot forbid the customers to hold the demonstration, because it is their wish to hold the demonstration.
The customers reportedly want to draw the leadership of the Tajik government”s attention to the problem of the half-finished facilities (eight apartment buildings) that were supposed to be put up for sale. Some 800 customers are expected to participate in the upcoming demonstration.
Tourabek Okhounov became acting director of the company, after his brother Jourabek Okhounov was arrested on November 2010.
On July 5, 2012, the Movarounnahr top manager Jourabek Okhounov was sentenced to 14 years in prison. The sentence followed his conviction on charges of a large-scale fraud, illegal entrepreneurship, and causing property loss by deception or abuse of confidence and misappropriation. The appeals court of Tajikistan”s Supreme Court considered an appeal by Jourabek Okhounov’s lawyers and partially acquitted him. The charge of causing property damage by deception or abuse of confidence was dropped and the court reduced Okhounov’s jail term by six months.
