DUSHANBE, December 25, 2008, Asia-Plus  -- On Thursday December 25, editors of four Tajik weeklies - SSSR , Nigoh , Millat , and Farazh – held a press conference to comment on the note delivered by the Russian Embassy to the Tajik MFA on December 24 over a number of articles published in Tajik newspapers.

A joint statement made by the editors of SSSR , Nigoh , Millat , and Farazh says that the note is unfounded and does not cite any example of Tajik newspapers’ negative remarks about Russian leadership and its policy.

Naming the note “ unreasonable and undiplomatic move,” the editors said that it was a blatant example  of undiplomatic action of the Russian Embassy over the period of its work in Dushanbe since 1991.

The statement, in particular, stressed that the Russian Embassy had sent copies of the note all local and foreign media active in Tajikistan.

“This year, Tajik MFA has received more than 10 notes over materials published by Tajik media but no one of them has been sent to media,” the editor said, adding that no of those notes contained assessing assertions like “purposeful deception of the Tajik public.”

The statement noted that the “abovementioned circumstances are evidence of the fact that the note was nothing more than “ostentatious event” in absence of the appointed Ambassador to Tajikistan.”

“We have considered and consider that relations between Tajikistan and Russia are allied and strategic irrespective of political views and goals of the governments and this factor prevails in interstate relations.  However, in the same time, we would like to draw attention to aggressive and hostile informational component of the present relations between our countries…  We hope the Russian government will pay attention to this problem,” the statement said.

We will recall that the Russian Embassy in Dushanbe on December 24 delivered a note to the Tajik Ministry of Foreign Affairs over a number of articles published in Tajik newspapers lately.  The note, in particular, said that some Tajik-language publications ( SSSR , Nigoh , Millat , Farazh ) are frequently publishing distorted information about the labor migrants’ problems and launching incorrect lunges at the highest leadership of Russia and its policy.  “…A special perplexity was caused by an article published in the Dushanbe weekly FK-capital that was accompanied by provocative commentaries and insults against the Embassy leadership,” the note said.  “We consider such occurrences to be inadmissible.  Attempts to present separate crimes committed by criminals against Tajik nationals in the territory of the Russian Federation as part of an official policy of the Russian leadership are nothing more than purposeful deception of the Tajik public.  Insistent tendencies among separate media of Tajikistan to present image of Russia as enemy of the Tajik people are at variance with traditional spirit of friendship and cooperation that unites our countries and peoples,” the note said.