A 27-year-old mother hanged her 5-year-old daughter and 3-year-old son and killed herself after an argument with her husband.
"On seeing his hanged wife and children, the husband took a rope and hanged himself too," the source said.
According to police statistics, 130 people have committed suicide in northern Tajikistan in the first half of 2008, almost double the figure in 2007. Family rows, domestic violence and poverty are cited as main causes.
According to United Nations Population Fund researchers, hundreds of people commit suicide in Tajikistan every year. Official figures do not reflect the scale of the problem, as many suicides are attributed to other causes by family members, who go to great lengths to conceal the "disgraceful" way their relative died.
