DUSHANBE, July 23, 20113, Asia-Plus — The Jamaat Ansarullah leader, Amriddin Tabarov, has never been among the members in the inner circle of the leader of the United Tajik Opposition (UTO), Said Abdullo Nuri, Mahmadali Hayit, the deputy head of the Islamic Revival Party (IRP) told Asia-Plus today morning.
According to him, Tabarov left the UTO and the IRP in 1994 when the UTO decided to begin negotiations on national reconciliation with the official Dushanbe.
“There were separate persons in the UTO who did not except the talks on national reconciliation and they left our ranks in 1994,” Hayit noted.
We will recall that in a report released at a news conference in Dushanbe, Interior Minister Ramazon Rahimov noted on July 19 that Amriddin Tabarov has been internationally wanted on suspicion of committing a number of serious crimes.
Amriddin Tabarov, 60, was born in the village of Samsolik, Nourobod district, some 100 kilometers east of Dushanbe.
Jourakhon Zoirov, the chief of the Interior Minister organized crime control department (UBOP) says that during the country’s 1992-1997 civil war, Tabarov was one of associates of Said Abdullo Nuri. According to him, Tabarov did not accept the peace treaty and fled to Afghanistan, where he joined the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU). “Later, he left IMU and organized Jamaat Ansarullah,” Zoirov added.
Jamaat Ansarullah, also known as the Society of Allah’s Soldiers, first came to light in September 2010 when the heretofore unknown organization claimed responsibility for a suicide attack on September 3 in Khujand. An explosives-packed car rammed into the building of the organized crime department of the regional police, killing two officers and two civilians and wounding 28 people. The suicide bomber was local resident Akmal Karimov, who was reportedly trained in al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
In September 2011, Jamaat Ansarullah issued several videos calling on Tajikistan’s citizens to embrace jihad against “infidels” and urging them to take action to support the implementation of Islamic Sharia law. “Those who pray namaz, who follow fasting rules but support democracy are nonbelievers,” a man on the video said. “Allah is killing nonbelievers by our hands and, thus, blesses us.” Some politicians and experts, however, doubt whether these videos can really be traced back to Jamaat Ansarullah.
