Former Tajik Prime Minister Abdumalik Abdullajanov's defense lawyer Andriy Fedur has filed an appeal against Kyiv's Shevchenkivsky District Court's ruling sanctioning Abdullajanov's extradition arrest.

"I filed an appeal against the court ruling today," Fedur told Interfax-Ukraine on Tuesday.

It was reported earlier that the Shevchenkivsky Court had sanctioned Abdullajanov's extradition arrest. Abdullajanov had been detained at Kyiv's Boryspil International Airport at the request of the Tajik authorities upon arriving in Kyiv from Los Angeles on February 5.

The Ukrainian State Migration Service said Abdullajanov had not applied for refugee status.

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees reminded Kyiv that Abdullajanov had refugee status in the United States and therefore, in line with international law, could not be extradited to any country.

The Boryspil Town Court in the Kyiv region granted the prosecutor's office request on Abdullajanov's temporary arrest for 40 days on February 7.

The Tajik Prosecutor General's Office forwarded documents to Kyiv substantiating Abdullajanov's extradition on February 18.

Amnesty International issued a statement in early March to urge Ukraine to deny Abdullajanov's extradition, warning that he could face torture at home.

Abdullajanov was appointed prime minister of Tajikistan in September 1992, but resigned in 1993 and was appointed ambassador to Russia soon afterwards. In 1994, he ran in the second presidential elections in Tajikistan but, according to official reports, lost to Emomali Rahmon, Tajikistan's current president.

After that, he left Tajikistan, stayed in Russia for several years, then moved to the United States in 1998 and has lived there since then.

Tajik authorities accuse Abdullajanov of plotting an assassination attempt on Rahmon on April 30, 1997, when the president was wounded in the leg. Abdullajanov was also charged with organizing a riot in the Sughd region, which claimed dozens of lives in 1998. The former prime minister has denied any involvement in his interviews to Western media.

Tajikistan has its next presidential election set for November this year, and it has been rumored over the last few months that Abdullajanov would support an opposition candidate who has not yet declared his participation. Abdullajanov has not been interviewed for a long time, and so his stand on the issue is unclear.