DUSHANBE, July 4, 2014, Asia-Plus – Around 30 U.S. academic gathered at the George Washington University in Washington D.C. last week to discuss Alexander Sodiqov’s case.
Speaking at the meeting, Dr. Eric McGlinchey of George Mason University noted that he thought that the Tajik government had made an honest mistake.
“Firstly Alexander is not a spy. John Heathershaw, the Principle Investigator on the project Alexander was working on has been nothing but transparent in conveying the nature of the project to the Tajik government. He has released all the documents related to the project both to the Tajik press and the international community. There is no question of what Alexander was doing in Khorog. John and I had a lunch in Bishkek [Kyrgyzstan] a week before Alexander was detained with various Kyrgyz and international colleagues and John was telling us all about the research. If one were engaging in espionage activities, it would be very strange if one were to telegraph those activities in front of an international audience. Nothing is being hidden here.
“As I have said, I think this is an honest mistake on the part of the Tajik government. How could such an honest mistake occur? I think it is the classic mistake of confusing causation and correlation. Some bad things happened in GBAO [the anonymous region of Tajikistan where Sodiqov was arrested] not long before Alexander arrived. Some bad things happened in GBAO two years before Alexander arrived. Some bad things happened in the Rasht Valley [also eastern Tajikistan] four years before Alexander arrived. So there are a lot of things happening in Tajikistan that from the point of view of the Tajik government, are very unsettling. The Tajik state has a lot to worry about in this region and the Tajik state is on edge. This is the classic kind of situation where people can make honest mistakes. So what I think happened here, is that a very savvy, charismatic, talented Tajik researcher, who happens to speak fluent English, came to Khorog to do research, and this was unusual. And unusual things gather attention. And as a result, the situation we see unfolded – the Tajik government came away with a mistaken interpretation of what he has been doing.
“This is not something the U.S. government is unfamiliar with. For the last couple of years I have been working on a case related to Ravil Mingaza, who is currently in Guantanamo. I am completely convinced Mingaza is in Guantanamo because the U.S. government has arrived at a mistaken interpretation of what he has been doing. So, the Tajik government can make mistakes, the U.S. government can make mistakes and I am actually paradoxically optimistic about this situation, because I think it is an opportunity for the Tajik government to show that due process works in Tajikistan. You can have a fair investigation, which will reveal what we already know to be true – that Alexander isn”t a spy – and he will be released in due course. By doing this the Tajik government will demonstrate, both to civil society and the international community that its system works.”
We will recall that Alexander Sodiqov, 31, a Tajik national residing in Canada, was detained in Khorog, the capital of the Gorno Badakhshan Autonomous Region (GBAO) on June 16, shortly after speaking with civil society activists there. He was later charged with high treason and spying.
