Dushanbe (AsiaNews/AFP) Tajikistan's President Emomali Rakhmonov told his fellow Muslim women to stay clear of mosques and pray at home. In a speech commemorating the republic's constitution, the President said that "a thousand years in the history of Islam show that it is preferable for women to worship at home, alone. [In order to] avoid conflict, it is better to ban them from mosques". He added that "we should not turn honest religious disputes into national problems, which could then themselves turn into religious conflicts".
Back in August, the Council of Ulemas had banned women from entering places of worship for the "sake of decency" since such places were not set up to accommodate them.
Tajikistan has a population of 6.3 million people, 96 per cent Muslim. Only ten of the thousands of mosques are reserved for women.
For many years now, Tajik authorities have been battling fundamentalist movements, in particular Hizbi Tahrir, a group which claims thousands of members throughout Central Asia and calls for the instauration of the Caliphate in the former Soviet republics. (FP)