DUSHANBE, October 3, 2014, Asia-Plus -- The 4th Dushanbe Book Exhibition entitled “The Book and Integration of Universal Values” kicked off at the State Complex Navrouzgohi Poytakht in Dushanbe today.

“76 publishing houses, including 59 domestic publishing houses and 17 publishing houses from the United States, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, China, Iran, Turkey, Russia and India are participating in the exhibition that runs through October 5,” Najmiddin Zayniddinov, the head of the exhibition management, told Asia-Plus in an interview.

According to him, the publishing houses have put on display more than 10,000 titles of books at the book fair.

“Tajik Government in March last year made a decision to hold the Dushanbe international book exhibition every year on September 3 to coincide with a Book Day,” said Zayniddinov.  “But this year, we decided to hold the exhibition in October on the occasion of the 600th anniversary of the great Persian and Tajik Sufi poet Nour ad-Din Abd ar-Rahman Jami, which will be celebrated on October 4.”