KULOB, August 26, 2010, Asia-Plus  -- President Emomali Rahmon has warned parents against sending children to foreign religious schools.

He remarked this yesterday afternoon during an address to a meeting of local administrators in the city of Kulob.

One of participants at the meeting told Asia-Plus that the president considers that on return home, graduates from foreign religious schools cannot adapt to the traditional way of life of Tajiks.

“Different perception of the world, different world outlook, and different traditions make these young men take inadequate actions and bring them, quite often, to ranks of terrorists and extremists,” the source cited the president as saying.  “And parents are responsible for this, unthinkingly sending their children abroad for doubtful studies,” Rahmon said.

Radio Liberty’s Tajik Service reported on August 25 that officially, some 2,000 Tajiks are currently studying at religious schools in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Iran, and Pakistan, though the actual number is thought to be higher.

According to RFE/RL’s Tajik Service, Abdulloh Rahnamo, a theologian with the Strategic Analytical Center at the office of the president, says that he agrees with the president''s request and that it is the ideas of graduates from foreign religious schools and madrasahs that bring about religious and security problems.  He adds, however, that the level of religious teaching within Tajikistan is not equal to that of foreign schools.

But independent expert Mahmud Latifi says that the attendance of Tajik students at foreign religious schools is not a problem if they are under the supervision of diplomatic representatives of Tajikistan, RFE/RL’s Tajik Service reported.