The 9th grade student from the Ruodaki district has died at the Lohour training ground after grenade for grenade launcher has exploded in his hand, according to the Interior Ministry press center.

The tragedy occurred on February 3.  The 9th grade student Sirojiddin Rajabov reportedly found a grenade for grenade launcher while collecting metal scrap at the Lohour training ground.  The grenade exploded when the teen hit it with a stone, the Interior Ministry press center said.

Criminal proceedings have been instituted and an investigation is under way.

RPG-7 is a portable, reusable, unguided, shoulder-launched, anti-tank rocket-propelled grenade launcher.  The RPG-7 can fire a variety of warheads for anti-armor (HEAT, PG – anti-tank grenade) or anti-personnel (HE, OG – fragmentation grenade) purposes, usually fitting with an impact (PIBD) and a 4.5 second fuze. 

The Lohour training ground is located in the Roudaki district, some fifteen kilometer to the south of Dushanbe. Under a government-to-government agreement signed between Tajikistan and Russia in October 2012, the training ground was handed over to the Russian military base until 2042.         

The Russian military base deployed in Tajikistan is Russia's largest non-naval military facility outside the country.  It was officially opened in Tajikistan in 2004 under a previous agreement, which was signed in 1993.  In October 2012, it was signed an agreement extending the term of deployment of the Russian military base in Tajikistan until 2042

A total of some 7,000 Russian troops are now stationed at two military facilities collectively known as the 201st military base - in Dushanbe and Bokhtar (formerly Qurghon Teppa), some 100 kilometers from Dushanbe.