Tajik court jails two for killing army official

DUSHANBE, Dec 25 (Reuters) A court in the former Soviet Central Asian state of Tajikistan sentenced two men to long jail terms today for killing a senior army official earlier this year.

Judge Shavkat Abdulkhairov said the two men shot dead Khakimsho Khafizov, head of Tajikistan's top military school, in revenge for not supporting an anti-government uprising in 1998.

Komilzhon Botirov was sentenced to life in prison, while Komilzhon Khuseinov received a 30-year sentence.

Tajikistan, a Muslim nation of seven million bordering Afghanistan, remains volatile and flooded with weapons after a 1992-97 civil war between Islamist guerrillas and the secular, Russia-backed government that killed more than 100,000 people.

REUTERS MS PM1718