DUSHANBE. April 25 (Interfax) - The Tajik authorities have brought back four children of citizens who fought on the side of extremists in Iraq, the Tajik Foreign press service said on Wednesday.
The Tajik diplomatic missions in Kuwait, Astana, Tehran, Ankara, Moscow and Istanbul were involved in the return of the children on the orders of President Emomali Rahmon in cooperation with the Tajik Interior Ministry and with the assistance of the Iraqi Foreign Ministry and other Iraqi structures, the statement said.
The Tajik Foreign Ministry thanked Iraq, the International Committee of the Red Cross, and UNIICEF for their assistance.
In September 2017, Russia's television channel RT aired a report from a shelter in Iraq where four children of Tajik citizens were living. The Tajik Interior Ministry later identified them. According to the agency, the children were Oisha, 16, Abdullo, 6, Fotima, 7, and Mukhamaddi, 3, children of Dushanbe resident Ilkhomiddin Aslomov, who had left Moscow for Iraq with his family three years before.
Ilkhomiddin Aslomov is now wanted for participation in the terrorist organization ISIL (banned in Tajikistan and Russia).
The ministry did not say whether the children were the children featured in the RT report.