Six employees of Radio Liberty have lost accreditation in Tajikistan for running news about the appointment of the President’s daughter to the country’s Foreign Ministry.

A statement from the radio station said, “after the publication of this information…  workers from the foreign ministry called the Radio Ozodi Bureau in Dushanbe, and demanded the urgent removal of the article, otherwise they will be deprived of accreditation.”

Concerns about the undermining of media freedom in Tajikistan have been expressed by a number of international human rights organizations, including Reporters Without Borders.  “[With] the economic and social situation in Tajikistan getting worse… the government wants to take strict control of the activities of all local media,” said Reporters Sans Frontieres’ Lyusie Morrilon.

According to Central Asian news website Centre1, there is a pattern of such punishments for media that do not follow the government’s strict reporting requirements:

Many Tajik media workers have been subjected to various kinds of pressures. One of the well-known journalists of the republic, Radio Ozodi employee Abdukayum Kayumzod was deprived of accreditation and was forced to terminate the agreement with the publication for his interview with one of the former commanders of the Tajik opposition.

The same pressure has experienced by BBC correspondent Anora Sarkorova. She was warned that she could lose accreditation and the bureau woudl be forced to close. She was forced to refrain from publishing for one month.