Tag: Russia

Tajiks to Strengthen Border With Afghanistan

As the international troop withdrawal from Afghanistan draws closer, Tajikistan is trying to strengthen its long frontier with that country as a safeguard against attempts to export instability.

Since Tajikistan took over border protection from Russia, whose troops performed the role until 2005, it has sought donor funding to modernise and consolidate its defences.

New border posts have been built or are planned, but existing ones are in need of refurbishment. And the Tajik frontier force is still using obsolete arms, equipment and radios from the Soviet era. Its vehicles date mostly from the early 1980s.

The audio programme, in Russian and Tajik, went out on national radio stations in Tajikistan, as part of IWPR project work funded by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Drugs Blight – Tajikistan

http://youtu.be/i7gD5bwsLH8

Nov 2007
Tajikistan is struggling to cope with an influx of cheap drugs from Afghanistan. The country has just one rehab clinic and on average, ten soldiers a year die in shoot outs with drug traffickers.

Last year, more than two billion dollars worth of heroin was smuggled from Afghanistan. “No matter how much effort we put into fighting the trafficking, the real problem is in Afghanistan”, complains General Nazarov. Many are nostalgic of the days of the Taliban, when heroin was much harder to obtain.

Islam Reborn – Tajikstan Documentary Film

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fzoFekT490

June 1996

Islam Reborn follows the return of Islamic refugees from Afghanistan to Tajikistan who were pushed out during the civil war.

The ruling Kulabis are reliant on Russian funding, and the resurrection of an Islamic mosque suggests the Islamists are yet again establishing a strong hold.

A report on the defeat and recovery of Islam in Tajikistan. A bus rumbles through the shimmering heat to a Russian check point. Behind it, 1300 miles of barbed wire mark Tajikistan’s border with Afghanistan. The bus contains anxious Garmis returning home from Afghan refugee camps. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, they were driven out by a vicious civil war between their own Islamic forces and the Soviet backed Kulabis. They now return, fearing reprisals from a new Kulabi government, but hoping after 4 years to resume normal life. In the south where the worst fighting took Place, villages are full of bombed out buildings and weary widows crouching in the dust. Starving hungry, they wait patiently for flour from the World Food Programme to be weighed out on antique scales and distributed. In the capital, Dushanbe, the Prime Minister claims stiffly that the economy is not collapsing and that “in the very near future we will be able to pay salaries”. With Russia‘s financial support, Kulabis cling onto power, stationing their khaki tanks on every tree lined avenue. But the careful restoration of an blue mosaic mosque represents an Islamic renaissance. If Russia pulls out, Garmis in exile may storm the capital and transform Tajikistan into an Islamic state. Report on the aftermath of civil war and the suppression of ethnic/political differences. Includes archive footage of the civil war.

Produced by ABC Australia
Distributed by Journeyman Pictures

Tajikistan’s army won’t reject the Kalashnikov

Tajikistan’s army won’t reject the famous Kalashnikov rifle within the next 10 or 15 years, the country’s Deputy Defense Minister Ramil Nadyrov has said.

This rifle was invented by Russian Mikhail Kalashnikov in 1947. Since then, over 100 million of such guns have been sold all over the world. In all this years, only slight modifications were added to Mr. Kalashnikov’s initial invention.

Tajikistan and some other former Soviet countries are now worried by Russia’s recent statement that it won’t purchase the famous gun any more.

“The Kalashnikov gun is the best,” Mr. Nadyrov says. “Take any Western-produced gun – you’ll find that it has drawbacks and can let you down in a decisive moment.”

VIA: The Voice of Russia