AKIPRESS.COM - A court in Khujand, Tajikistan's second-largest city, has found 11 men guilty of belonging to the militant Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) group, reports RFE/RL.

Two of the convicted men had sought to fight in Syria, according to the BBC's Russian service.

The IMU was formed in 1998 with the aim of toppling the Uzbek government and founding an Islamic state based on Shari'a law in its place. The group is outlawed in Tajikistan.

The 11 men were arrested in September together with another 40 suspects. According to the indictment, all of the 11 men who were convicted on December 19 had lived for long periods in Russia.

Two of the men, named as Mansur Boboyerov and Eldardzhon Khotamov, had allegedly planned to travel to Syria and fight in militant groups. Flight tickets were confiscated from the two men when they were arrested in September, according to the indictment.

The CA-News site, citing the Tajikistan-based TojNews outlet, said that the men were sentenced to between 9 and 19 years in prison.

CA-News named Boboyerov as the ringleader of a local cell called Jundullah, which was linked to the IMU. According to the report, Boboyerov, who is from the town of Panjakent in Sughd province, was sentenced to 19 years in a corrective labor colony with a strict regime.