Uzbekistan accepts 400 extra refugees from Afghanistan – Russian state media | World information

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Uzbekistan has taken in around 400 more refugees from Afghanistan and placed them in temporary shelters near the Afghan border, Russian state news agency TASS reported on Saturday, citing an unnamed source familiar with the matter.

It is unclear how many Afghans entered the former Soviet republic when Taliban insurgents overran Afghanistan. The Tashkent government has denied that they included high-ranking Afghan figures such as ethnic Uzbek leader Abdul Rashid Dustum.

However, around 650 Afghan officers from units under Dustum’s command were already in the same health center, TASS quoted the source as saying.

Uzbekistan said on Friday it had sent 150 Afghan refugees back to Afghanistan under an agreement with the Taliban and at the request of the refugees themselves.

(Reporting by Polina Devitt; editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)

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