| Tajikistani Civil War | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of thepost-Soviet conflicts and spillover of theAfghan Civil War (1992–1996) | |||||||
 Spetsnaz soldiers of the15th Independent Special Forces Brigade during the Civil War | |||||||
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
| |||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
 / Rahmon Nabiyev/Akbarsho IskandrovEmomali Rahmon Islam Karimov / Boris Yeltsin / Nursultan Nazarbayev / Askar Akayev  Hassan Abaza |   Sayid Abdulloh Nuri (UTO)Mohammed Sharif Himmatzade (IRP) Shadman Youssof (Democratic Party) | ||||||
| Strength | |||||||
| /Tajikistan: 42,000–45,000/Russia: 5,000–15,000 border troopsUzbekistan: 20,600/Kazakhstan: 10,300/Kyrgyzstan: 278[3] Total strength: 78,178–91,178 | Estimated: around 50,000–70,000 | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| 302 killed, 1,583 wounded (only Russian casualties)[4] | Unknown | ||||||
| 20,000[5]–150,000 killed[6] 1.2 million displaced | |||||||
| Part ofa series on |
| Moderncivil wars |
|---|
 |
TheTajikistani Civil War[a] was an armed conflict in Tajikistan that began in May 1992 and ended in June 1997. Regional groups from theGarm andGorno-Badakhshan regions ofTajikistan rose up against the newly formed government of PresidentRahmon Nabiyev, which was dominated by people from theKhujand andKulob regions. The rebel groups were led by a combination ofliberal democratic reformers andIslamists, who would later organize under the banner of theUnited Tajik Opposition.[7] The government was supported by Russian military and border guards.[8]
The main zone of conflict was in the country's south, although disturbances occurred nationwide.[9] The civil war was at its peak during its first year and continued for five years, devastating the country.[9][10] An estimated 20,000[5] to 150,000[6] people were killed in the conflict, and about 10 to 20 percent of the population of Tajikistan were internally displaced.[8] On 27 June 1997, Tajikistan presidentEmomali Rahmon,United Tajik Opposition (UTO) leaderSayid Abdulloh Nuri andSpecial Representative of the United Nations Secretary-General Gerd Merrem signed theGeneral Agreement on the Establishment of Peace and National Accord in Tajikistan and theMoscow Protocol inMoscow,Russia, ending the war.[11]
There were numerous causes of the civil war in Tajikistan, such as economic hardship, communal way of life of Tajiki people and their high religiosity. Under Soviet PresidentMikhail Gorbachev's 'Perestroika' policies, a Muslim-Democratic movement began to emerge in Tajiki SSR. The backbone of opposition wereParty of Tajikistan Muslim Resurrection,Democratic Party of Tajikistan and some other movements. The fight between the former communist elite and opposition shifted from the political sphere to an ethnic and clan based one.
Tensions began in the spring of 1992 after opposition members took to the streets in demonstrations against the results of the 1991 presidential election. PresidentRahmon Nabiyev and Speaker of theSupreme Soviet,Safarali Kenjayev, orchestrated the distribution of weapons to pro-government militias, while the opposition turned tomujahideen in Afghanistan for military aid.
Fighting broke out on 5 May 1992 between old-guard supporters of the government and a loosely organized opposition composed of ethnic and regional groups from theGharm andGorno-Badakhshan areas (the latter were also known asPamiris). Ideologically, the opposition includeddemocraticliberal reformists and Islamists. The government, on the other hand, was dominated by people from theLeninabadi region, which had also made up most of the ruling elite during the entire Soviet period. It was also supported by people from the Kulob and Regar (Tursunzoda) region, who had held high posts in theMinistry of Internal Affairs in Soviet times. After many clashes, the Leninabadis were forced to accept a compromise and a new coalition government was formed, incorporating members of the opposition and eventually dominated by them.[12] On 7 September 1992, Nabiyev was captured by opposition protesters and forced at gunpoint to resign his presidency.[13][14] Chaos and fighting between the opposing factions reigned outside of the capitalDushanbe.
With the aid of the Russian military andUzbekistan, the Regari-KulobiPopular Front forces routed the opposition in early and late 1992. The coalition government in the capital was forced to resign. On 12 December 1992 theSupreme Soviet (parliament), where the coalition faction between Khujand and Kulob had held the majority of seats all along, convened and elected a new government under the leadership ofEmomali Rahmon, representing a shift in power from the old power based in Leninabad to themilitias fromKulob, from which Rahmon came.
The height of hostilities occurred from 1992 to 1993 and pitted Kulobi militias against an array of groups, including militants from theIslamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan (IRP) and ethnic minority Pamiris fromGorno-Badakhshan. In large part due to the foreign support they received, the Regari-Kulobi militias were able to soundly defeat opposition forces and went on what has been described byHuman Rights Watch as anethnic cleansing campaign against Pamiris andGarmis.[15] The campaign was concentrated in areas south of the capital and included the murder of prominent individuals, mass killings, the burning of villages and the expulsion of the Pamiri and Garmi population into Afghanistan. The violence was particularly concentrated inQurghonteppa, the power base of the IRP and home to many Garmis. Tens of thousands were killed or fled to Afghanistan.[16][17][18][19]
Ibodullo Boimatov and his units in coalition with Kulobi forces also played a crucial, decisive role to the victory against the opposition. Starting off with a few hundred men in Regar with support from Uzbekistan against the local oppositional juntas - who were discriminatively targeting Uzbeks of the region, too soon Boimatovs militia grew to few thousand units and aided heavily the Kulobi coalition against the opposition. His men seized the control of capital Dushanbe twice during the course of war from the opposition forces.
In Afghanistan, the opposition reorganized and rearmed with the aid of theJamiat-i-Islami. The group's leaderAhmad Shah Masoud became a benefactor of the Tajik opposition. Later in the war the opposition organized under an umbrella group called theUnited Tajik Opposition, or UTO. Elements of the UTO, especially in theTavildara region, became theIslamic Movement of Uzbekistan, while the leadership of the UTO was opposed to the formation of the organization.[20]
Other combatants and armed bands that flourished in this civil chaos simply reflected the breakdown of central authority rather than loyalty to a political faction. In response to the violence theUnited Nations Mission of Observers in Tajikistan was deployed. Most fighting in the early part of the war occurred in the southern part of the country, but by 1996 the rebels were battling Russian troops in the capital city ofDushanbe.
AUnited Nations-sponsoredarmistice finally ended the war in 1997. This was in part fostered by theInter-Tajik Dialogue, aTrack II diplomacy initiative in which the main players were brought together by international actors, namely the United States and Russia. The peace agreement eliminated the Leninabad region (Khujand) from power. Presidential elections were held on 6 November 1999.
TheUTO warned in letters toUnited Nations Secretary GeneralKofi Annan and Tajik PresidentEmomali Rahmon on 23 June 1997 that it would not sign the proposed peace agreement on 27 June if prisoner exchanges and the allocation of jobs in the coalition government were not outlined in the agreement.Akbar Turajonzoda, second-in-command of the UTO, repeated this warning on 26 June, but said both sides were negotiating. President Rahmon, UTO leaderSayid Abdulloh Nuri and Russian PresidentBoris Yeltsin met in theKremlin inMoscow on 26 June to finish negotiating the peace agreement. The Tajik government had previously pushed for settling these issues after the two sides signed the agreement, with the posts in the coalition government decided by a joint commission for national reconciliation and prisoner exchanges by a future set of negotiations. Russian Foreign MinisterYevgeny Primakov met with the Foreign Ministers of Iran, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan to discuss the proposed peace accord.[21][22]
By the end of the war, Tajikistan was in a state of complete devastation. Around 1.2 million people were refugees inside and outside the country. Tajikistan's physical infrastructure, government services and economy were in disarray and much of the population was surviving on subsistence handouts from international aid organizations. The United Nations established aMission of Observers in December 1994, maintaining peace negotiations until the warring sides signed a comprehensive peace agreement in 1997.[23]
Journalists were particularly targeted for assassination and at least 40 Tajik journalists were killed.[24] Many more fled the country, leading to abrain drain. Notable individuals murdered include journalist and politicianOtakhon Latifi, journalist and Jewish leaderMeirkhaim Gavrielov, politicianSafarali Kenjayev and four members of theUnited Nations Mission of Observers in Tajikistan:Yutaka Akino, a noted Japanese scholar of Central Asian history; Maj.Ryszard Szewczyk fromPoland; Maj.Adolfo Scharpegge fromUruguay; andJourajon Mahramov from Tajikistan;[25] and documentary filmmakerArcady Ruderman, fromBelarus.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link){{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link){{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link){{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
