Amnesty International has urged Tajik authorities to immediately release jailed activists from the Central Asian nation's Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Region (GBAO), which is home to the community known as the Pamiri minority. In its statement on September 21, Amnesty said the activists were "arbitrarily detained, tortured and unfairly convicted." Since May 2022, Tajik authorities have stepped up their ongoing crackdown on the GBAO residents, and imprisoned more than 200 activists, including journalists and rights defenders, on terrorism and extremism charges that domestic and international rights watchdogs call "trumped up."
