DUSHANBE, April 19, 2013, Asia-Plus -- The European Court of Human Rights has urged Russia not to extradite to Dushanbe a Tajik citizen facing religious extremism charges, Radio Liberty reports.

The court reportedly said on April 18 that sending Ismon Azimov to Tajikistan would subject him to the risk of ill-treatment.

We will recall that Ismon Azimov was arrested in Russia on November 3, 2010 at Tajikistan’s request.

Ismon Azimov is accused of being a member of the banned Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU).  Tajik prosecutors also have charged Azimov with plotting an attack on a provincial police headquarters in the northern city of Khujand, which killed four people in March 2010.

Azimov, however, denies the charges.

According to Amnesty International, his lawyer was informed on June 29, 2011, that the Deputy Prosecutor General had decided to extradite him.  Ismon Azimov has applied for asylum in Russia.  At the end of June the Federal Migration Service of Russia turned down his appeal against an earlier decision by the Moscow Region Department of the Federal Migration Service denying him refugee status.

Azimov’s lawyer and the NGO Institute for Human Rights in Moscow, which had invited the lawyer to represent Ismon Azimov and has followed the case closely, maintain that he has no association with the IMU.

Amnesty International has said Tajikistan routinely subjects prisoners to extreme abuse, including torture, and Ismon Azimov would be at serious risk of torture or other ill-treatment if returned to Tajikistan.