"The detainees are active members of the Hizb ut-Tahrir party, which were involved in sabotage activity in the cities of Khujand, Chkalovsk and the Bobojon Gafurov district," the statement reads.
Videotapes, books and an extremist newspaper were seized from the detainees, it reads. They "will soon be charged with fomenting religious and ethnic hatred, as well as appeals to overthrow the constitutional order in Tajikistan," the statement reads.
The majority of Hizb ut-Tahrir members are detained in northern Tajikistan at the border with Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. In particular, a court in northern Tajikistan convicted seven Hizb ut-Tahrir members last month.
The Hizb ut-Tahrir organization was set up in Palestine in 1952. The party’s headquarters are located in London. Hizb ut-Tahrir’s goal is to overthrow constitutional regimes in Muslim states and create a caliphate, a single Islamic state. The organization is on the list of extremist and terrorist organizations in Kazakhstan, Russia, Tajikistan and the United States. The party’s leaders, however, claim it does not seek the fall of constitutional regimes.