1907 Solar Eclipse Expedition by Sergei Prokhudi-Gorskii, Russian Photographer in Central Asia.
This is my little newsletter on Tajikistan that comes out once a week on Saturdays. If you want to see past issues, look to the column on the right down below for the key word "Tajikistan". If you want to get this in your email or you have comments or contributions, write [email protected]
COMMENTS:
I'm going to bookmark this page at Registan, Central Asia 2014 The Terror, scoffing at Jacob Zenn's piece, Militants Threaten to Return to Central Asia After Withdrawl of Nato. And the best way to see who is right is to come back in a year and see what we have.
As I've seen New Realist Eurasia Foundation Young Pro, Kerry think-tanker and long-time defense analyst Joshua Foust of Registan trash Zenn before when he reported factually on terrorists in Kazakhstan, I take it all with a grain of salt. I have no separate information. I have only questions. Zenn says:
The Southeast Asian militants who returned to their home countries after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan carried out or trained others to carry out terrorist attacks, which killed hundreds of people, but, they proved much less effective at generating change than the mass social movements in the Arab World in 2011. As long as the populations of Central Asian countries remain vigilant to the threat posed by these militant groups, the fighters returning from Afghanistan will likely be able to only carry out sporadic attacks but gain no traction in society. However, crises like the ethnic riots in Urumqi in 2009, the ethnic clashes in Osh in 2010, the deadly Zhanaozen protests in 2011, and the instability in Tajikistan’s Gorno-Badakshan in 2012, all have the potential to erode government legitimacy, while increasing support for alternatives to the present leadership. Most alternatives come in the form of opposition parties, but some of those who have been aggrieved may turn toward groups like the TIP, Jund al-Khilafah and the IMU instead.
Everything about this statement seems prudent; it doesn't overstate the case -- if anything it points out that the last time this happened after the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan, it didn't amount to much. Of course, that was before the Internet.
Defense consultant Nathan Hamm is scornful:
Whether or not terror groups are likely to be more active in Central Asia after NATO withdraws from Afghanistan is a useful thing to think about, but it is vital not to overhype the risks. The governments of the region are phenomenally imaginative at devising and hyping threats to justify not only repressive domestic policies but to extract concessions from Western governments in the forms of financial assistance and tempered criticism of their human rights abuses. Assessments of the risk of terrorism need to capture the scale and timeline for the risk. Zenn is correct that there is a risk of the “return” of Central Asian terror groups at some unspecified point in the future. However, Central Asian security services have shown more than sufficient capability to monitor and disrupt terror groups. Furthermore, as grim as it is to point out, Afghanistan and Pakistan will continue to be much more permissible and target-rich environments for all of these groups.
Both of them seem to think these governments will remain strong, although they face rattling as Karimov in Uzbekistan is going to have a succession and Rahmon in Tajikistan will have "elections" and there could always be another toppling in Kyrgyzstan.
In any event, for the purposes of this newsletter, the Tajik situation might not be so much "returning warriors" as opportunistic kinsmen or brotherly fighters seeing an opening. We don't know how it's going to turn out. Sure, Afghanistan and Pakistan will always be worse; maybe even Pakistan more than Afghanistan. But that doesn't mean the post-Soviet stans will be quiet. What would be more advantageous, staying in a place where the Taliban and related allies no longer need you and you have no unifying factor with them to fight NATO/the US? Or returning to your own country or travelling to neighbouring kin in order to use your acquired battle skills?
Nate Schenkken said on Twitter that Islamist terror from returning warriors should be on the list of concerns, but only under something like drug lords; he blames them for the pogroms in Kyrgyzstan. There's nothing to say that the two things can't coexist in one gang, however.
* Ten Tajiks Killed in Moscow Blaze, Exposes Poor Working Conditions
* This just in! Rahmon Likely to Win Elections!
* Tajikistan Caves on Fuel Deal with Russia
A fire ripped through a new Moscow building’s underground parking lot on Saturday, killing 10 migrant workers and injuring 13 others who had been working and living there, city police said.All those who died were citizens of Tajikistan, Moscow police said in a statement. It said they were killed after a garbage heap on the floor they were working on caught fire, but the cause of the blaze itself was under investigation.
Uzbek Cuts off Gas to Tajikistan France 24 h/t @ericamarat
The impoverished Central Asian state of Tajikistan said Monday that it had been cut off from natural gas shipments by its neighbour and sole energy supplier Uzbekistan.
Why Do Millions Leave Tajikistan for Offshore? etajikistan h/t @nateschenkaan
The IMF in its report of last year wrote that around US $3.5 billion from Tajikistan was deposited in offshore accounts. Zafar Abdulloev, a Tajik journalist researching economic issues, claims that the entities from Tajikistan with offshore accounts are: Talco, the aluminum factory; Innovative Road Solutions or IRS, and companies belong to the Tajik businessman Hasan Asadullozoda, brother-in-law of President Emomali Rahmon.
Window on Eurasia: Tehran Must Buy Water from Tajikistan to Overcome Drought, Iranian Deputy Says
Ali Ironpour, a member of the agriculture committee of the Iranian parliament, says that Tehran can solve the problems of drought in eastern Iran by purchasing some one billion cubic meters of water from neighboring Tajikistan, a step he says the two governments agreed to in May 2012.
Russia, Tajikistan Getting Closer to Military Base/Fuel/Migration Deal (Bug Pit/EurasiaNet.org)
Russia and Tajikistan have come to an agreement on one of the sticking points in their deal to extend the lease of Russia's largest military base in Central Asia, reports Tajikistan's minister of energy and industry Gul Sherali. As part of that deal, Russia agreed to duty-free fuel shipments to Tajikistan, but wanted a guarantee that the discounted fuel wouldn't be reexported. Tajikistan had objected, but now has agreed to Moscow's terms.
And...Russian troops and Tajik border guards are really, really going to be able to check on 1m tonnes of oil products and make sure they never, ever get re-sold anywhere else, Scout's honour?
Tajikistan Backs Down on Fuel Talks with Russia (bne.eu h/t @dtrilling)
Moscow insists on the clause because of the high level of fuel smuggling in south Central Asia and the risk of fuel delivered to Tajikistan being sold on to third countries such as Afghanistan. Dushanbe had previously objected to the clause, with Tajik officials saying they would be unable to guarantee that gasoline from Russia will not be re-exported.
Trilling thinks Tajikistan has no leverage. True enough, but it has something else -- continued non-compliance and pleading the inability to monitor all those mountain roads not even demarcated. This is an regular ritual...
Predictions for 2013 from Myles Smith
Surprise, surprise, Rahmon will be elected.
Tajikistan’s ever-more-ridiculous elections exercise will end predictably, as we all wonder how far Emomali Rakhmon can push his authority over economic and political life of the ostensibly conflict-averse population. Who among us has not thought that this was the year that the country would implode, divide into ungovernable de facto criminal states, and drag the whole region in. He’s gone ‘too far’ with the IRPT, HT, Pamiri clans, Turajonzoda’s clan, or myriad other rivals to maintain his power base. But, it has not happened yet, somehow, so we stop predicting it.
I agree. We were endlessly hearing how that overcrowded teeming Ferghana Valley was going to explode, too, but then the state managed to sterilize the women and suppress the demonstrations and keep the lights dim...
Tajikistan Remains Hell for Gays (Global Voices)
A recent discussion in the country's blogosphere offers a rare glimpse into what it means to be gay in Tajikistan and how the country's people view members of the LGBT community.
‘It means PAIN…'
... It was decided that the [gay] should be taught a lesson. About eight of our classmates beat him up in the bathroom. They beat him up badly; there was a lot of blood on his face and clothes…
Tajikistan is a transit point for one of the most lucrative drugs routes
in the world. Illegal drugs from neighbouring Afghanistan flood into
the country on their way to Russia and Western Europe.
Rustam Qobil travels to remote border villages in Tajikistan to find out how communities are being affected by the drugs trade.
INL’s “Sport Against Drugs” campaign, Dushanbe, Tajikistan, February 19, 2012. International Narcotics and Law
Enforcement (INL) section of the U.S. Embassy and local partner NGO
National Olympic Academy (NOA) organized an anti-drug dance competition
titled “Jam Master” at the Spartak Youth Center in Dushanbe on February
19, 2012.
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Check out my Pinterest -- I want someone to bring me this in the cold of New York City right now like in the cold of these Tajik mountains.
