The Prosecutor-General’s Office has reportedly launched an investigation into an incident that took place in Khorog, the capital of the Gorno Badakhshan Autonomous Region (GBAO), Sunday (January 13) evening.   

Umarjon Emomali, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, says that a group of local residents allegedly attacked police officer and he used traumatic handgun.  “The police was on duty and he had the right to use the traumatic handgun,” Emomali said.

The Interior Ministry spokesman refrained from giving further details noting that the Prosecutor-General’s Office is investigating the incident.  

Asia-Plus still failed to get any information from the Prosecutor-General’s Office.

According to the latest data, a man who sustained wound in that incident is currently undergoing medical treatment in a hospital.

Meanwhile, one of uses of the closed Pamir News website on Facebook, Saidmansour Shoikov, writes that special police unit (OMON)’s vehicle, violating traffic regulations, did not give way to a car driven by local resident.  Moreover, they reportedly began insulting the driver.  According to Shoikov, special police unit officers began chasing the car and caught it up at the crossroad in the center of the city, where wrangle occurred and one of local residents was wounded from traumatic handgun.

It is not the first incident in Khorog with use of traumatic gun.  OMON commander, Major-General Khurshed Muhammadzoda, reportedly fired a traumatic pistol at a group of people in Khorog’s Tirchid neighborhood late on November 4, wounding three men.  

A statement, released by the Interagency Staff for Security in GBAO, says the shooting occurred after five young men attacked a traffic-police car.  A police officer allegedly fired from his car into a group of local men with a traumatic pistol (a type of firearm that discharges powerful but typically non-lethal rounds) after they vandalized a police service vehicle.  

Meanwhile, Subhon Sabzaliyev, a 31-year-old resident of Khorog, who was one of the people shot, said that the incident occurred shortly before midnight on November 4.  According to him, they were staying near the house, when Mercedes pulled up to them and police officer fired from the car into them.  Subhon identified the man who shot at him as Khurshed Muhammadzoda, a commander with the OMON (special police unit). 

At least 100 people, mainly young people, gathered in Khorog on November 6 for protest rally demanding an investigation into an incident in which a police officer shot and wounded three local men.  Protesters also demanded that the authorities remove police checkpoints that were set up in the city in September.  GBAO governor Yodgor Fayzov met with the protesters and promised that a special commission would thoroughly investigate the incident.

Following that incident, he authorities blocked access to social media networks for several days.

Recently, the authorities have blocked access to social networks again following arrest of Tohir Mamadboqirov, the younger brother of one of local informal leaders Mamadboqir Mamadboqirov, also known simply as Boqir.  Tohir Mamadboqirov was taken into custody in connection with charges of hooliganism dating back to 2014.