An official statement by Tajikistan's Foreign Ministry alleging that an RFE/RL correspondent was beaten in Kyrgyzstan has turned out to be false.
In its September 22 statement, the ministry accused the Kyrgyz government of persecuting its ethnic Tajik community, mentioning among alleged cases of such persecutions "an ethnically motivated attack in Kyrgyzstan's Osh region on September 18 against a Tajik woman, Nasibakhon Davronbekova, who is a correspondent for RFE/RL."
However, RFE/RL does not have any correspondent in Kyrgyzstan or elsewhere by that name.
The ministry removed the sentence in question from the statement shortly afterward.
The Kyrgyz Foreign Ministry condemned the Tajik statement, calling it "provocative."
"The statement of the Tajik side about the existence in Kyrgyzstan of some kind of 'policy of persecution of citizens of Tajikistan and ethnic Tajiks' is completely inappropriate and indicates that representatives of the Foreign Ministry of Tajikistan are out of touch with reality and have no idea about the state of affairs in the Kyrgyz Republic," it said.
Tajikistan's accusations about alleged persecutions of ethnic Tajiks in Kyrgyzstan comes amid high tension between the two neighboring nations following deadly clashes along the border last week.
