DUSHANBE, December 10, 2012 Asia-Plus -- An exhibition of work by known Tajik press photographer Muhiddin Olimpur will open at the Mino Gallery in Dushanbe on December 13.

“More than 40 works by Muhiddin Olimpur will be put on display at the exhibition,” known Tajik cameraman Zaur Dakhte, who is one of organizers of the exhibition, told Asia-Plus in an interview.

“We, several his friends, have decided to organize this exhibition in order to keep alive the memory of Muhiddin Olimpur, one of famous Tajik press photographers, who became the victim of the civil war,” Zaur Dakhte said, noting that photographs put on display a the exhibition show the beauty of Tajikistan.

“We would like people to remember him and his unique works,” Dakhte added.   

Muhiddin Olimpur was killed during the country’s civil war in mid-1990s.  We will recall that Muhiddin Olimpur, head of BBC’s Persian Service bureau in Tajikistan, was found dead near Tajik National university in Dushanbe with a gunshot wound to the head in December 1995.

On July 29, 2003, Tajikistan’s Supreme Court convicted two suspects in the murders of Muhiddin Olimpur and Viktor Nikulin, a correspondent with the Russian television network ORT, who was shot dead outside of ORT’s office in Dushanbe in March 1996.

Narzibek Davlatov and Akhtam Tohirov were sentenced to 15 and 22 years in prison, respectively, for serving as accomplices in the slayings.  The two men were arrested in October 2001, and their trial began in June 2003.

According to the Tajik authorities, the murders were ordered by Nozim Yunusov, a field commander with the United Tajik Opposition who died during the civil war.

The convictions come a week after a Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) delegation traveled to Tajikistan and called on the government to investigate and prosecute those responsible for the murders of dozens of journalists during the country''s 1992-1997 civil war.