Rasht fighting
Politics and Society, TajikistanNo Comment
Asia-Plus reports that another shootout has taken place in the Rasht Valley, this time near Nourobod. National Guardsmen were attacked and got away with injuries, but at least six of the attackers were allegedly killed. Judging by their appearance, the dead men weren’t local, a source claimed. It’s the latest in a series of battles being fought between a mysterious enemy and government agencies. Trouble started in early May, after the government moved in to the Rasht area to conduct a drug operation, Poppy 2009. But most observers think this is a cover, and there is speculation that the men with guns are either former IRP fighters from the civil war or foreign jihadists who’ve crossed back from Afghanistan and/or Pakistan. Or both.
But what was ex-cabinet minister and former civil war opposition chief of staff Mirzo Ziyoyev’s involvement in all of this? And who killed him? Not us, says Tohir Yuldash, or a man claiming to be Tohir Yuldash, the leader of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, in an audio message sent to RFE/RL. However, the report makes no mention of any denial on the part of Mr Yuldash that the fighters who are giving the Tajik Interior Ministry a run for their money in the mountains around Tavildara are IMU.
Last weekend, the Interior Ministry for the first time claimed publicly that the people they were fighting might be militants. A drugs gang led by an IMU operative known as Azizov Nemat, is apparently the source of the trouble. And it’s his gang that is supposed to have killed Mr Ziyoyev in a crossfire. It is quite unfortunate that the Interior Ministry, who had a duty of care towards Mr Ziyoyev after claiming they had arrested him, allowed that to happen.
Foreign journalists are beginning to snoop around this story. Al Jazeera and AFP have both filed from the Rasht Valley this week. Another Islamist commander from the civil war, Mirzokhujo Ahmadov told AFP the fighting had been going on for some time between former opposition members and the government. He told Al Jazeera he and his supporters would also be prepared to take up arms against the government, if necessary. He is accused of killing an OMON officer in 2008, so he is understandably twitchy that Dushanbe might be coming after him. But that is another story.
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