Zafar Suleymani: Tajikistan turns into a wick for the "Central Asian spring"
The “shot” of Uzbekistan on the Tajik economy turned out to be precautionary, although very powerful. At the same time, it was accompanied by a signal about the possibility of demonstrating military force in the area of the border Farhad dam with a controversial status. Here, according to local residents, there was an accumulation of armored vehicles from the Uzbek side.
The cessation of the supply of Uzbek gas for a short period paralyzed the Tajik economy. It became clear that the “control shot” of Tashkent would be fatal for the ruling regime of Tajikistan, Imomali Rakhmon. It was for the regime, as the Tajik embassy in Moscow directly admitted in an official report, accusing the Uzbek side of "inspecting hotbeds of social tension and growing discontent among the country's population regarding the leadership of Tajikistan."
But the Uzbek "prohibitions", in addition to indirect influence - through society, were aimed mainly at providing a direct negative effect personally for President Rahmon. After all, enterprises that local media called the “personal pocket” of the head of Tajikistan, including the aluminum giant TALCO, remained without gas.
Obviously, the resumption of gas supplies, in conditions when the official reason for their termination was “lack of resources in connection with contracts with Russia and China,” was accepted by the Uzbek side as a result of intervention by an influential mediator. Moreover, immediately after the resumption of gas supplies, passions were calmed down on the border of the two countries. In the city of Bekabad, a working meeting of the commanders of the border troops of the two countries took place, which agreed to strengthen confidence-building measures at the jointly guarded state border.
Judging by the subsequent emotional speech of the President of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon 17 on April, that is, the day after the resumption of the supply of Uzbek gas, this mediator was not Russia.
The collapse of the system in Tajikistan at this stage could be an unpleasant surprise for the United States, leading practical negotiations with the Tajik president regarding the future development and protection of borders with Afghanistan. It is not excluded that the Americans became the mediator between Tashkent and Dushanbe. In this case, Rakhmon’s claims to Moscow’s “non-valuing” partnership seem more than logical.
But this does not change the main thing. The target of the Uzbek side is precisely the Rakhmon regime. That is, the speech in this case, apparently, is about interpersonal or, rather, “inter-regime” confrontation, which makes untenable any recommendations and advice on improving Tajik-Uzbek relations in general. That is why, for example, even a revision of the position of Dushanbe on the construction of the Rogun hydropower station - the main conflict topic between the two countries - is unlikely to help mitigate the struggle. Obviously, the financial resources collected from the population under pressure, which should have been used for the construction of hydropower plants, could be used, for example, to develop the gas and energy potential with the mutual interest of the country supplying raw materials - Uzbekistan. Or, the participation of the Uzbek side in the Rogun project can be envisaged. However, in the current difficult socio-economic situation, multimillion-dollar national investments are actually frozen in incomprehensible accounts, and some of them, according to incoming information, are used to maintain the current balance of banks affiliated with the Rakhmon family.
On a heavy external background, the domestic policy of the Tajik president is becoming impulsive and risky. In early March of this year, one of the sites (zvezda.ru) was leaked about a secret meeting of the leadership of Tajikistan with the participation of heads of law enforcement agencies. As stated in the published documents, the President of Tajikistan instructed the security forces to compile lists of activists of the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan (IRPT), find sources of their funding and take steps to remove active supporters from the ranks of the party. As if confirming the authenticity of these data, government agencies began checking in the offices of the IRPT, relations with which are heating up as a result of prohibitive measures by the Tajik leadership in the field of religious human rights. It is no coincidence that the leader of the IRPT Muhiddin Kabiri of April 17-18 held consultations with the ambassadors of Russia and the United States in Tajikistan, apparently familiarizing the latter with possible countermeasures of his numerous organization.
In view of the above, President Emomali Rakhmon’s appeal to Russia regarding respect for partnership with Tajikistan can be regarded as the next move in Rakhmon’s multi-position foreign policy game, which is actually under the temporary protection of the United States. The upcoming withdrawal of American allies from Afghanistan may dramatically alter the regional situation, as it happens in the Middle East with the weakening of the US military presence in Iraq.
It is primarily about radicalizing public sentiment (and here the ideological basis of the IRPT can be the main pole of the pull of protest potential) and the intensification of cross-border problems and threats. Such a probability is all the more so that the Americans and their NATO allies will leave Afghanistan mainly through Central Asia, promising to the local regimes the surplus of exported weapons.
In this situation, it is completely senseless to appeal to Russia for the Tajik president. It would be more honest, at least, to sign an agreement to extend the deployment of the 201 Russian military base, especially since it was already agreed upon during the visit of Dmitry Medvedev in Dushanbe. Better yet, urge Moscow to support Tajikistan in protecting its borders with Afghanistan. What dividends the Tajik side will bring is difficult to predict. Maybe it will cause new problems, now with the United States and China. It is even more difficult to judge how such a presence is timely and effective for Russia itself. Nevertheless, such a policy would not contradict the current challenges facing Tajikistan, and would also correspond to the logic of Rakhmon’s claims against Moscow.
The President of Tajikistan, on the one hand, calls for taking into account the active membership of his country in the CSTO defense bloc with Russia, and on the other, systematically reduces Russia's participation in solving the most difficult and operational problem - protecting the external border (one with Russia) of the security space on the Afghan frontier. At the same time, the Tajik side is trying to convince itself that it is coping with this most difficult task, although the facts indicate the opposite situation.
The lack of logic in Emomali Rakhmon’s actions in the Russian direction can be explained only by one thing - the presence of a different logic in his relations with other centers of power, which are actively working in the Central Asian region. How this maneuver will end for the Tajik president, time will tell.
So far it is clear only that Tajikistan is on the verge of serious internal transformations, thereby recalling the “wick” for a possible future “spring”, but already Central Asian.
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