KULOB, July 22, 2013, Asia-Plus -- 130 residents of the Kulob region in the Khatlon province have been fined a totaled of 5,160 somoni for breaking the country’s tobacco-controlled law.

The deputy chief of the Interior Ministry’s office for Kulob, Abduvahhob Iskandarov, stated this at a news conference in Kulob on July 22.

We will recall the tobacco-controlled legislation – The Law on Limited Use of Tobacco – came into effect in Tajikistan on January 1, 2011.  Under this law, sale of tobacco and smoking in schools, hospitals, organizations and enterprises irrespective of forms of their property, airports, train stations, recreation areas, sports and culture facilities and in public transport is banned.  Additionally, sale of tobacco closer than 100 meters to kindergartens, schools, hospitals and other educational and healthcare institutions is banned.  The law also bans sale of tobacco to and by teenagers.  Smokers now have to use special places.  Those who break the law will have to pay a fine from 5 to 15 indexes (where one index makes 35 somoni) for natural persons and from 3 to 300 indexes for legal entities.

Speaking at the news conference, Iskandarov also noted today that 267 foreigners have been registered in the area during the first half-year of 2013 and 55 of them have been expelled for violating stay rules.

829 crimes have reported in the city and the district of Kulob over the same six-month period, 229 cases more than in the same period last year, Iskandarov said.  101 serious crimes, including five murders and five rapes, have been reported in the area over the report period.

According to Iskandarov, 93.2 per cent of all the crimes have been solved in the first half-year of 2013.