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ISIL: 200 Muslims arrested in Uzbekistan

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For allegedly having the intention to join the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), or being sympathetic to the armed group, at least 200 Muslims have been arrested in Uzbekistan a human rights group says.

The arrests started in early October in and around the Uzbek capital, Tashkent, and take place almost daily amid massive checks and searches, the Initiative Group of Independent Rights Defenders said on Monday.
Most of the arrested men are migrant workers who returned home from Russia, Turkey or Western Europe and have nothing to do with ISIL, the group’s chairman, Surat Ikramov, told Al Jazeera.

Read also: ISIS claims responsibility for Paris attacks

“They find five real militants and arrest 50 innocent men who will be tortured and forced to confess,” he said. “Some of them are not even observant Muslims.”

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