Daniil Islamov from Dushanbe has refused to execute his military duties on religious grounds.
The Qurghon Teppa military prosecutor’s office has completed investigation into the case of conscript Daniil Islamov and it has moved to a court.
Criminal proceedings have been instituted against the 18-year-old Dushanbe resident Daniil Islamov under the provisions of Article 376 (1) of Tajikistan’s Penal Code – avoiding military service. The trail will begin after September 10.
A source in the Qurghon Teppa military prosecutor’s office says Daniil Islamov was drafted into the army this past spring and he was sent to serve in a military sub-unit deployed in Qurghon Teppa. “The young man rejected military service. Islamov said that he is follower of Jehovah's Witnesses and his refusal to serve in the military is based on religious beliefs,” the source added.
Radio Liberty’s Tajik Service reports that when being summoned to the military registration and enlistment office in Dushanbe, Daniil Islamov said that he refuses to serve in the army and agrees to do an alternative civilian service.
Meanwhile, Tajikistan has not yet adopted the law on the alternative civilian service, though a special commission at the Ministry of Defense worked out the draft law on the alternative civilian service in the spring and submitted it for consideration to the Government.
Tajik human rights activists have also worked out the draft law on the alternative civilian service but is final version has not yet been coordinated.
Tajikistan's Jehovah Witnesses were banned throughout the entire country in 2007. The Tajik authorities' main complaint was that Jehovah's Witnesses refuse military service. Besides, they reportedly also propagated their faith in public places, which directly contradicts the Law.
Jehovah's Witnesses is a millenarian restorationist Christian denomination with nontrinitarian beliefs distinct from mainstream Christianity. The group reports a worldwide membership of more than 8.3 million adherents involved in evangelism and an annual Memorial attendance of more than 20 million. Jehovah's Witnesses are directed by the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses, a group of elders in Warwick, New York, which establishes all doctrines based on its interpretations of the Bible. They prefer to use their own translation, the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures, although their literature occasionally quotes and cites other Bible translations. They believe that the destruction of the present world system at Armageddon is imminent, and that the establishment of God's kingdom over the earth is the only solution for all problems faced by humanity.
The group emerged from the Bible Student movement, founded in the late 1870s by Charles Taze Russell with the formation of Zion's Watch Tower Tract Society, with significant organizational and doctrinal changes under the leadership of Joseph Franklin Rutherford. The name Jehovah's witnesses was adopted in 1931 to distinguish themselves from other Bible Student groups and symbolize a break with the legacy of Russell's traditions.
Jehovah's Witnesses are best known for their door-to-door preaching, distributing literature such as The Watchtower and Awake!, and refusing military service and blood transfusions.
