Tajik Police Use Firearms To Disperse Rare Protest By Chinese Workers, 22 May 2020

Tajik police have used firearms to break up a rare protest by Chinese workers employed by the Tajik-Chinese Mining Company in the northern region of Sughd.

Interior Ministry officials told RFE/RL on May 21 that some 60 Chinese workers had protested in the town of Zarnisor a day earlier.

A spokesman for the Sughd regional police department told RFE/RL that local police shot live rounds into the air to disperse the protesters after it boiled over. No gunshot wounds or injuries were reported.

The mining company's administration says police were called after the protesting Chinese workers refused to stop the rally.

The workers' demands remain unclear, as it is not possible to access them.