MOSCOW (Reuters) – Uzbekistan has accepted about 400 more refugees from Afghanistan and put them up in temporary accommodation near the Afghan border, the Russian state news agency TASS reported on Saturday, citing an unnamed source familiar with the matter.
It is unclear how many Afghans have crossed into the former Soviet republic as Taliban insurgents overran Afghanistan. The Tashkent government has denied that senior Afghan figures such as ethnic Uzbek leader Abdul Rashid Dustum were among them.
However, approximately 650 Afghan officers from units commanded by Dustum were already at the same health centre, TASS cited the source as saying.
Uzbekistan said on Friday that it had sent 150 Afghan refugees back to Afghanistan as per an agreement with the Taliban and after requests from the refugees themselves.
(Reporting by Polina Devitt; editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)
