Deputy head of the Customs Service’s office for Sughd province has been arrested on suspicion of corruption.
Deputy head of the Customs Service’s office for Sughd province, Faridoun Benazirzoda, was reportedly arrested by officers from the State Committee for National Security (SCNS)’s office for Sughd in Khujand on May 1.
According to some sources, Benazirzoda was arrested within the framework of criminal case of a number of top investigators and officials of the Agency for State Financial Control and Combating Corruption who were arrested on April 24.
Until 2015, Benazirzoda had worked with the anticorruption agency. He had served as deputy chief of the anticorruption agency’s office for Dushanbe. In 2015, Benazirzoda was transferred to work with the Customs Service and over the past two years, he worked at the Customs Service in Dushanbe. He was transferred to Sughd only two months ago, the source said.
Recall, more than 10 top investigators and officials of the anticorruption agency were arrested on April 24.
Thus, a former deputy chief of the anticorruption agency, Davlatbek Khairzoda, was reportedly detained on the border with Kyrgyzstan as he sought to flee the country. Among the detained, there is also Jamoliddin Mahmadzoda, the head of inspections department in the anticorruption agency, and the head of the investigative department, Firouz Kholmuroda. One eye-catching target of investigations is Firdavs Niyozbadalov, an investigator with the anticorruption agency, who was involved in the investigation into the former minister of industry Zaid Saidov. Saidov’s lawyers and human rights activists had complained that Niyozbadalov used unlawful methods and resorted to physical intimidation during that investigation.
Another anticorruption agency official, Umed Kamolov, is wanted but does not yet appear to have been detained.
All the people detained are facing charges of corruption, forging document and abuse of office.
