Tajikistan Denies Extraditing Leader Of Tondar Exile Group To Iran

DUSHANBE (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 04th August, 2020) Tajikistan denies extraditing the leader of an anti-Tehran exile royalist group whose detention has recently been reported by Iran, Interior Minister Ramazon Rahimzoda said on Monday.

The Javan newspaper, linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, earlier reported that Tondar leader Jamshid Sharmahd had been detained on July 31 in Tajikistan and handed over to the Iranian authorities.

"The information from a number of Iranian media outlets that Dushanbe extradited Jamshid Sharmahd, an active opponent of the Iranian authorities, to Tehran does not correspond to reality," Rahimzoda told reporters.

The minister noted that not a single person had been extradited from Tajikistan to Iran and vice versa in the first half of the year.

According to Iranian media, Sharmahd was seized as a result of a complex operation. The California-based Tondar group is considered a terrorist group in Iran and is suspected of masterminding a number of bombings and assassinations.