DUSHANBE -- Noted Tajik journalist Abdullo Ghurbati has been sentenced to 7 1/2 years in prison on charges he and his supporters have called unfounded.
The Dushanbe-based Independent Center to Defend Human Rights, which provided Ghurbati with a lawyer, told RFE/RL that the verdict and sentence were pronounced on October 4 at a trial held behind closed doors on the premises of a detention center in the Tajik capital.
The court found Ghurbati guilty of publicly insulting an authority, minor assault of an authority, and participating in the activities of an extremist group.
The latter charge, the most serious, was linked to Ghurbati's business relations with Tajik businessman Idibek Latipov, who has been living and working in Egypt since 2007.
Investigators say Ghurbati received money from Latipov for making a YouTube video advertising his company, while Latipov was included on the Tajik National Bank's registry of individuals involved in "terrorist or extremist activities."
Ghurbati has insisted that he was not aware that Latipov was on the registry and that his ties with the man were purely business-related.
Latipov told RFE/RL by phone that his inclusion on the National Bank's registry was groundless.
Prosecutors sought eight years in prison for the journalist. Ghurbati's lawyer, Abdurahmon Sharipov, told RFE/RL that his client had continued to insist that he was not guilty during the trial.
Ghurbati and blogger Daleri Imomali, known for articles critical of the government, were detained on June 15 and subsequently sent to pretrial detention for two months.
Imomali was charged with illegal entrepreneurship and premeditated false denunciation. His trial is pending.
In June, Human Rights Watch demanded that Tajik officials immediately release Ghurbati and Imomali, saying that the two men "are being targeted for their professional activities, despite being protected by Tajikistan's laws and international obligations on freedom of expression and media freedom."
Tajik President Emomali Rahmon has been criticized by international human rights groups for years over his disregard for independent media, religious freedoms, civil society, and political pluralism in the tightly controlled former Soviet republic.
