Officers to visit theatre monthly

Police in Tajikistan have been ordered to brush up their cultural knowledge with regular trips to the theatre.

Police “of all ranks” will now be expected to visit the theatre at least once a month, interior ministry spokesperson Umarjon Emomali said.

Attending the theatre will “raise the spiritual and cultural level of police officers and also reduce tiredness after a difficult and stressful day at work,” Emomali said.

Tajikistan’s President Emomali Rakhmon in 2015 launched the construction of a theatre that is set to be the biggest in the mainly Muslim region.

In 2012 the country opened the largest library in ex-Soviet Central Asia – but then had to ask the public to help fill it with books.