Tajik minister assassinated

DUSHANBE, Tajikistan -- Tajikistan Culture Minister Abdurakhim Rakhimov has been shot dead by an unknown gunman.

The assailant shot Rakhimov early Saturday as he was leaving his house in the western district of the capital Dushanbe, a police spokesman told Reuters news agency.

The minister died instantly and the gunman, armed with a pistol, escaped.

The reasons for the murder were unclear, the spokesman said.

The ex-Soviet state of 6.2 million is due to celebrate the tenth anniversary of its independence on Sunday.

Rakhimov became the third senior Tajik official to be assassinated by unknown criminals since the start of the year.

Deputy Interior Minister Khabib Sanginov was killed in April and presidential adviser Karim Yuldashev died in July.

The 49-year-old culture minister had been in charge of preparations for the national holiday.

Tajikistan, an impoverished Central Asian state that borders Afghanistan and China, remains chronically unstable and flooded with arms after a bloody civil war in 1992-97 which claimed lives of tens of thousands.

Kidnappings and killings are a reality in the mountainous country where maverick warlords claim control of whole regions.

Reuters contributed to this report.