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Abstract
This article considers the experience of civil war in Tajikistan (1992–1997). This civil war represents the most significant violent episode in post-Soviet Central Asia; over a five-year period at least 50,000 people were killed and approximately one tenth of the population were displaced. This article will examine the role of local and international actors during this civil war, with a particular focus on the role that international aid and aid agencies played in governance of vulnerable populations and the impact these interventions had on conflict dynamics and the ability of insurgents to govern in areas under their control.
Notes
1. While Uzbekistan has faced an active insurgency in the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), it has been able to contain it relatively effectively through harsh repressive measures (McGlinchey, Chaos, Violence, Dynasty); the most significant breakdown in public order in Uzbekistan in recent years occurred in Andijon in 2005 and was blamed by the regime on religious extremists, a claim that is disputed (Megoran, ‘Framing Andijon’; International Crisis Group, ‘Uzbekistan’). Elsewhere in the region, threats of Islamic extremism, including alleged threats linked to Hizb-Ut-Tahrir, the IMU, or other Islamist extremist groups have also been cited as justification for repressive measures but have not resulted in outright insurgency (Karagiannis, ‘Rise of Political Islam’; Karagiannis, Political Islam; International Crisis Group, ‘Radical Islam’; Bleuer, ‘Instability in Tajikistan?’).
2. See Lewis, ‘Kyrgyzstan’ and the special issue of Central Asian Survey (Vol. 27, nos. 3–4) edited by Sally Cummings for a discussion of Kyrgyzstan’s experience of colour revolutions and McGlinchey, ‘Exploring Regime Instability’ for a discussion of significant interethnic violence linked to political elites in southern Kyrgyzstan in 2010.
3. This potential threat remains, however – particularly with respect to extensive regions of northern Kazakhstan adjacent to Russia with significant ethnic Russian populations. Ethnic Russians have only been partially integrated into political and economic life in Kazakhstan with ongoing tensions within Kazakhstan between civic and ethnic visions of the country. To date, however, Kazakhstan has successfully managed both the domestic and international challenges associated with this. See Laruelle and Peyrouse, Les Russes du Kazakhstan; Laruelle, ‘La question des Russes’; and Ó Beacháin and Kevlihan, ‘Threading a Needle’ for further discussion.
4. International Crisis Group, ‘Tajikistan’.
5. Atkin, ‘Thwarted Democratization in Tajikistan’; Niyazi, ‘Islam and Tajikistan’s Human and Ecological Crisis’; Wennberg, ‘The Globality of Tajik Nationalisms’; Hickson, ‘Using Law to Create National Identity’.
6. Atkin, ‘Tajikistan’; Heathershaw and Herzig, ‘Introduction’.
7. While the terms ‘Tajik’ (i.e. speakers of Tajik/Farsi/Dari) and ‘Uzbek’ (i.e. speakers of Turkic languages) have traditionally referred to speakers of one language or the other, in Soviet times they were used as ethnic classifications for the purposes of nation-building within the Soviet system. Rather than reflecting any cleanly homogenized grouping in the first place, divergent linguistic and ethnic communities were categorized as one or the other, on the assumption that the designations of Uzbek and Tajik would ultimately absorb other adjacent marginal groups and ethnic minorities (Centlivres and Centlivres-Demont, ‘Tajikistan and Afghanistan’). As such, neither term should be considered an ethnic classification in a primordialist sense.
8. Atkin, ‘Tajikistan’.
9. Rakowska-Harmstone, Russia and Nationalism in Central Asia; Khalid, Islam after Communism.
10. Jahangiri, ‘Premises’.
11. Atkin, ‘Thwarted Democratization in Tajikistan’.
12. Rakowska-Harmstone, Russia and Nationalism in Central Asia.
13. Akhmedov, ‘Tajikistan II’.
14. Akiner, ‘Prospects for Civil Society in Tajikistan’.
15. An equal number of Tajik (Dari) speakers were estimated to be living south of the Amu Dar’ya river in northern Afghanistan at that time. Jawad and Tadjbakhsh, ‘Tajikistan’.
16. Atkin, ‘Tajikistan’s Civil War’.
17. Lynch, ‘Separatist State and Post-Soviet Conflicts’; Wennberg, ‘The Globality of Tajik Nationalisms’.
18. Collier, ‘Doing Well Out of War’.
19. Sambanis, ‘Conclusion’.
20. Davies, ‘What Explains African Civil Wars?’.
21. Thyne, ‘ABC’s, 123’s’; Urdal, ‘A Clash of Generations?’; Humphreys, ‘Natural Resources’.
22. Buhaug et al., ‘Square Pegs in Round Holes’; Cederman et al., Inequality, Grievances, and Civil War.
23. Autesserre, ‘Local Violence, National Peace?’; Kalyvas, Violence in Civil War.
24. Weinstein, Inside Rebellion; Metelits, Inside Insurgency; Kevlihan, Aid, Insurgencies and Conflict Transformation.
25. Kevlihan, ‘Structural Conditions for Conflict Mediation’.
26. Human Rights Watch, ‘Human Rights in Tajikistan’; Tunçer Kılavuz, Power, Networks and Violent Conflict.
27. Akiner, Tajikistan.
28. Tunçer Kılavuz, ‘The Role of Networks’; Power, Networks and Violent Conflict; and ‘Understanding Civil War’.
29. Mitchell, ‘Civilian Victimization’.
30. Juraeva, ‘Ethnic Conflict in Tajikistan’.
31. The majority of IRP members were ‘Gharmis’ (i.e. either from the mountainous Gharm region of Tajikistan or descendants of settlers from Gharm who now resided in irrigated land in southern Tajikistan). Pamiris come from the remote and mountainous Gorno-Badakhshan region of eastern Tajikistan or are descendants of people from that region settled in southern Tajikistan or the capital Dushanbe.
32. Rubin, ‘Tajikistan’; Jonson and Archer, ‘Russia and Peacekeeping in Eurasia’; Neumann and Solodovnik, ‘The Case of Tajikistan’; Rubin, ‘Russian Hegemony’; Lynch, Russian Peacekeeping Strategies; Mitchell, ‘Civilian Victimization’.
33. Heathershaw and Herzig, ‘Introduction’.
34. Markowitz, ‘Unlootable Resources’.
35. De Danieli, ‘Counter-Narcotics Politics in Tajikistan’.
36. Driscoll, ‘Inside Anarchy’ and ‘Exiting Anarchy’.
37. Ubaidulloev, ‘Afghanistan-Tajikistan relations’.
38. The remote eastern Pamir Mountains along the border with China and Afghanistan was first annexed by the Soviet Union to the territory of the Tajik autonomous region in 1925 under the name Gornyi (Mountainous) Badakhshan (Atkin, ‘Tajikistan, Reform Reaction and Civil War’ Citation1997). Residents of this region (typically referred to as Pamiris) have been designated for statistical purposes as ethnically Tajik since the Soviet period, but can be distinguished from other Tajiks on linguistic and religious grounds. Pamiris, while speaking languages of Iranian origin, do not speak dialects of Tajik/Farsi/Dari as their first language. Instead languages spoken in the Pamir region derive from distinct east Iranian. Roots Pamiris also differ from the rest of the country because the majority are Ismaili rather than Sunni Muslims
39. During the summer and autumn of 1992 street demonstrations in Dushanbe had brought opposition forces – including democrats, regional representatives from the Pamirs, and the IRP – into government in the capital. The assault by pro-establishment forces on the capital dislodged this coalition from government. The question of which party was the insurgent and which the government was settled at this time by the victory of pro-establishment forces. Nonetheless, their hold, even on Dushanbe, remained precarious for some months, with certain neighborhoods remaining outside formal government control for some time. Driscoll (‘Exiting Anarchy’) provides an important analysis that details the manner in which many local militias aligned with one side or the other were either absorbed or eliminated during the conflict and immediate post-conflict period.
40. Hiro, Between Marx and Mohammed.
41. Akhmedov, ‘Tajikistan II’.
42. Roy, The New Central Asia.
43. Per interviews with Pamiris and those familiar with the region.
44. Keshavjee, Bleeding Babies in Badakhshan.
45. Bliss, Social and Economic Change in the Pamirs.
46. Cunha, ‘The Badakshani’.
47. Anderson, Do No Harm; Kevlihan, Aid, Insurgencies and Conflict Transformation.
48. A number of factors appear to have assisted in these negotiations. First, the new government in Dushanbe seems to have been willing to negotiate a separate stand-off with the region. While not quite a peace agreement, these understandings served to reduce threat levels with respect to the Pamirs. Second, the presence of Pamiris within the new administration appears to have helped build confidence. Interviews conducted in Dushanbe indicate that these influential Pamiris paved the way for a successful meeting between representatives of the Aga Khan and President Rahmon of Tajikistan that led to official approval being granted for the AKF to work there. Finally, the presence of Russian forces protecting the borders also appears to have been an important factor. A local Tajik analyst (interviewed by the author in Dushanbe in October 2007) reported that the Russian presence protecting the borders was influential in convincing the Presidential administration that the Pamiris did not present an Islamic fundamentalist threat to their interests.
49. Rubin, ‘Tajikistan’.
50. Mackinlay and Cross, Regional Peacekeepers.
51. Bliss, Social and Economic Change in the Pamirs.
52. Other organizations, including MSF-France, WFP, the ICRC, and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies also provided some assistance to the region (Keshavjee, Bleeding Babies in Badakhshan), but the AKF was by far the most important in terms of scale and scope of assistance provided.
53. Per interview conducted by the author in Dushanbe, October 2007. The relative autonomy of the AKF from both the Tajik government and donors supporting this assistance, particularly early in the war, is illustrated by the absence of donor representatives and central government officials in the region. The first donor visit to Gorno-Badakhshan made by US government representatives (who were providing the bulk of humanitarian assistance to Tajikistan as a whole, including this region) together with UN officials was made only in 1995. While the central government maintained locally recruited officials in Khorog (the capital of Gorno-Badakhshan) throughout the conflict, interviews with a former government health minister (conducted in Dushanbe in June 2008) and a former USAID employee (interviewed in Dushanbe in October 2007) confirmed that the first central government minister did not visit the region until 1994. This first visitor reportedly received a frosty reception, resulting in his return to Dushanbe that same day after delivering some medical supplies.
54. This section draws primarily from interviews with two aid workers: one Tajik and originally from the Gharm region, the other a long-term expatriate, who both worked in the region during the war or shortly thereafter. Both interviews were conducted in Dushanbe in October 2007.
55. A number of distinct armed groups, for example, controlled access on the main road to the valley through the use of checkpoints, with NGO personnel regularly being put under pressure to provide soldiers with medicines or other assistance in order to facilitate passage (based on interviews conducted in Tajikistan noted above).
56. For a summary of the events leading to the outbreak of the Tajik civil war, see Kevlihan and Sherzamonov, ‘Tajikistan’ and related sources cited therein.
57. Rubin, ‘Tajikistan’.
58. Ferrando, ‘Soviet Population Transfers’.
59. Kosach, ‘Political Parties in an Inchoate National Space’; Foroughi, ‘Tajikistan’; Roy, The New Central Asia. Tunçer Kılavuz (Power, Networks and Violent Conflict) notes that during this period Popular Front forces, despite being bottled up in Kulyab, also largely eliminated any pro-opposition Kulyabi supporters in their home areas and consolidated internal control in their heartland.
60. Interviews conducted in Kurgan Teppa and adjacent Boktar and Vakhsh regions indicate the variegated nature of control in these areas throughout much of the summer and early autumn of 1992. The city of Kurgan Teppa, for example, was split between Popular Front and opposition forces for many months. While it was possible for residents to move around the town, it was often dangerous to do so, and transportation was difficult to access.
61. Human Rights Watch, ‘Human Rights in Tajikistan’.
62. Neumann and Solodovnik, ‘The Case of Tajikistan’; Akiner, ‘Prospects for Civil Society in Tajikistan’.
63. Rubin, ‘Tajikistan’; Whitlock, Land Beyond the River. These reports were confirmed in interviews with two former refugees who crossed into Afghanistan at this time (conducted by the author in Tajikistan in June 2008).
64. The new government agreed, for example, to a US government proposal that established a framework for NGO operations in Tajikistan in 1993. It also gave key actors involved in social service provision – notably AKF and UNHCR – an unusual degree of freedom in providing services in particular conflict affected regions. These agencies played important roles in facilitating conditions on the ground that ultimately contributed to peace.
65. The actual numbers that left Tajikistan are estimated to be much higher. Whitlock (Land Beyond the River) estimates that approximately 30,000 did not stay in Afghanistan for long. Instead they walked east along the bank of the Amu Darya river and re-entered Tajikistan in the Gorno-Badakhshan area. This arduous trek occurred during the winter in this mountainous region.
66. Rubin, ‘Tajikistan’; Human Rights Watch, ‘Human Rights in Tajikistan’.
67. Kenyon Lischer, Dangerous Sanctuaries; Terry, Condemned to Repeat?.
68. Human Rights Watch, ‘Tajik Refugees’.
69. Akcali, ‘Islam as a ‘Common Bond’’.
70. Orr, ‘The Russian Army and the War in Tajikistan’.
71. Goryayev, ‘Architecture of International Involvement’.
72. One former refugee reported facing tense conditions during a visit back to southern Tajikistan in 1993. He was a member of the first party to return to the country under UN auspices. The purpose of the visit was to survey conditions and report back to refugees located at Camp Sakhi. The delegation faced allegations that they had sided with the UTO, but after discussions, became satisfied that it was possible for people to return (per interview with the author, conducted in Shartuz in June 2008).
73. Human Rights Watch, ‘Human Rights in Tajikistan’.
74. In 1994, for example, an employee of the humanitarian organization MSF was taken from a NGO vehicle and shot dead because he was from Gharm (Richter, ‘Springtime in Tajikistan’). More generally, Human Rights Watch has highlighted how returning refugees were restricted to their home kolkhozes because of fears for their safety (Human Rights Watch, ‘Return to Tajikistan’), while Gomart (‘Between Civil War and Land Reform’) reports of young women of Pamiri and Gharmi origin staying at home from school because of fear of attack as late as 1996. See also Mitchell (‘Civilian Victimization’) for further detail. Mitchell notes that returning young Gharmi males were particularly vulnerable to targeted violence and as a consequence may have elected in large numbers to join opposition forces after repatriation/return.
75. Human Rights Watch, ‘Human Rights in Tajikistan’.
76. Human Rights Watch, ‘Return to Tajikistan’.
77. Hunt, ‘Tajikistan’.
78. Rigacci Hay, ‘Methodology of the Inter-Tajik Negotiation Process’.
79. Rubin, ‘Tajikistan’; Human Rights Watch, ‘Human Rights in Tajikistan’.
80. Rubin, ‘Tajikistan’.
81. Human Rights Watch, ‘Tajik Refugees’. Limited sporadic assistance was apparently provided by UNHCR (including plastic sheeting, blankets and possibly vaccines), and international NGOs Relief International and MSF. However, Western NGOs sometimes encountered opposition when they attempted to work in these camps. In November 1993, for example, MSF sought to provide services to Tajik refugees in Kunduz but faced opposition from the NGOs operating there. Possibly because of the relatively limited capacity of these organizations (whose service delivery capacity, per one former resident of Kunduz camp interviewed in June 2008, was not as consistent or as strong as services supported by UNHCR in Sakhi Camp), MSF was subsequently allowed limited access (Rubin, ‘Arab Islamists’).
82. Rubin, ‘Arab Islamists’.
83. The mix of assistance from Islamic sources, apparently including both Sunni and Shia (of Iranian origin) sources is interesting. While UTO supporters were generally Sunni Muslims, they were also Farsi speakers, giving them cultural connections with Iran. A journalist’s account of a visit to one of these camps provides some supporting evidence (Whitlock, Land Beyond the River). Bagh-e Sherkat was the largest camp in the Kunduz region. Inside this camp, she reported some 30 mosques with attached schools providing Islamic education to refugee children, using the Arabic, instead of Cyrillic script (the latter being used in Tajikistan since the 1930s). Health conditions were reportedly difficult, with only limited drug supplies available in this camp, donated by Iran and Saudi Arabia.
84. Per interview conducted by the author in Tajikistan, June 2008.
85. Per interview conducted by the author in Tajikistan, June 2008.
86. Grant Smith, ‘Tajikistan’; Olimov, ‘The Policy of Russia in Central Asia’; Saunders, ‘The Multilevel Peace Process in Tajikistan’.
87. Akiner, ‘Political process’; Rashid, Taliban, Islam, Oil.
88. Orr, ‘The Russian Army and the War in Tajikistan’.