Tajikistan has suspended the BBC’s local FM services.

The decision to suspend the service was made on 10 January and follows the adoption of a law requiring foreign media outlets with FM services to register with the Justice Ministry.

The BBC said the 20-day registration deadline had been “unrealistic” because the process normally took up to six months to complete.

Britain’s envoy to Tajikistan, Graeme Loten, said in a statement that the embassy had expressed its concern to the Tajik Foreign Ministry. He called the suspension a “misunderstanding.”

It is too soon to tell if this is just a “misunderstanding,” as Loten says, or if this is another example of Central Asian governments using the “registration and regulations” weapon of free speech repression. The Committee to Protect Journalists certainly isn’t happy about the move.

If it is indeed nothing more than an error, it will be sorted out quickly, and we will know the truth soon enough. For now, the Tajik government should probably be given the benefit of the doubt.