Institute of War and
Peace Reporting / News from Central Asia /
http://www.iwpr.net/?p=rca&s=f&o=343749&apc_state=henh
Unclear borders and
poor communications blamed for latest dispute over
water resources.
By Yrys Kadykeev in
Bishkek and Jamila Majidova in Dushanbe (RCA No.
539, 02-Apr-08)
Kyrgyzstan and its neighbour Tajikistan are caught
up in a diplomatic spat after a local clash erupted
on the two countries’ shared border over access to
water. Although the two countries generally enjoy
good relations, this dispute reflects the vital
importance of water in Central Asia – exacerbated by
the lack of clarity about where exactly
international borders lie.
The incident began
on the evening of March 26 on the border of
Kyrgyzstan’s southern Batken district and Isfara in
Tajikistan. About 150 Tajiks, accompanied by their
district government chief and police officers
crossed what, according to Kyrgyzstan at least, is
the border. Equipped with a digger, they proceeded
to try to destroy a dam that was blocking an
irrigation canal that feeds the land around the
Tajik village of Hoja Alo as well as areas on the
Kyrgyz side.
At this point,
Kyrgyz border guards arrived on the scene, and
according to a statement they issued later, “assumed
combat positions” and scared the Tajiks away.
Tensions appeared to ease after Kyrgyz officials
arrived and agreed to open the dam and resume the
flow of water into Tajikistan.
But the Kyrgyz
border service reported another incident the
following day, when another 150 or so villagers
accompanied by frontier guards from Tajikistan
crossed the border again. This time they started
trying to clear the channel of the Isfara river. The
Kyrgyz border forces moved in and “evicted them”,
according to the statement they issued.
On March 28, the
Kyrgyz foreign ministry summoned the Tajik charge
d’affaires to express the government’s concerns over
the incident. It urged Tajikistan to take action to
ensure similar “illegal actions” did not occur in
future. Regional experts say the tensions over water
highlight the need for better cross-border
communications at a local level.
They fear that
growing pressure on land and water resources in the
heavily-populated Fergana valley means clashes of
this kind will happen again, and could potentially
escalate into broader conflict. The canal at the
centre of the dispute was dammed as a temporary
measure, as part of a 300,000 US dollar project
financed by the World Bank to clear and refurbish
the waterway in Kyrgyzstan.
The Tajiks insist
the dam is located in an area where the boundary
line between the two states has not been agreed.
They say the Kyrgyz did not inform them that the
canal was going to be blocked off, and they had to
take action when they found themselves with no
irrigation water during eight crucial days of the
spring growing season.
Muhiba Yoqubova, the
mayor of Isfara, told IWPR that the Kyrgyz version
of events was inaccurate, and that it failed to
acknowledge the existence of different maps of the
area. “We didn’t invade at all,” she said. “We
recognise the [border shown on the] 1924 map, while
they use the 1958 map, which Tajikistan has never
ratified. This territory is therefore under dispute,
and as a rule agricultural and construction work is
prohibited on disputed land until such time as an
inter-governmental commission and joint commissions
complete the demarcation.”
In the Soviet Union,
the borders between different constituent republics
were mainly for administrative purposes. Especially
in Central Asia’s difficult terrain, there were many
areas where boundaries were never clearly mapped out
on the ground. Yoqubova criticised the World Bank
for getting involved in the canal work, saying this
violated the institution’s rule that projects
involving waterways in disputed areas should not be
funded.
“This project should
have been coordinated with our [Tajik] agencies –
with local government or at least with the water
ministry,” she said. A statement from the Soghd
regional administration, which covers the whole of
northern Tajikistan, confirmed that the incident
stemmed from a failure to notify the Tajiks of plans
to refurbish the canal.
Salamat Alamanov,
head of the department for regional affairs in the
Kyrgyz government, accepted that there had been a
breakdown in communications. “The Kyrgyz side needed
to carry out repairs on the system for several days,
so they shut off the water supply temporarily,” he
explained to IWPR. “But the Tajiks weren’t informed
of this. We need to pay attention to such details
and notify people about our actions in good time.”
Alamanov said the
squabble merely underlined the pressing need for new
cross-border agreements on the use of water, under
which each country would be able to put the case for
its particular interests but also show regard for
the needs of its neighbours. Vafo Niatbekov, a
foreign policy specialist at the Tajik president’s
Centre for Strategic Studies, added that it was
important for diplomatic channels to be kept open
between national leaderships so that local disputes
of this kind could be either avoided or defused.
Otherwise, he
warned, such conflicts could escalate into “open
armed confrontation”.
“One can see a trend
emerging for confrontations over water,” he
continued. “They might start out as local spats, but
they could grow to reach inter-governmental
dimensions.” Parviz Mullojanov, a political
scientist in Tajikistan, agreed that the situation
called for a new approach to water and borders.
In recent years, he
said, these issues had been essentially “frozen” as
governments ignored the need to demarcate their
borders properly. One reason was the tortuous shape
of the map in this part of the world; another was
that there was a real fear that local communities
might take matters into their own hands if a
demarcation decision went against them and cut into
their land.
“These issues have
always been acutely controversial,” noted Mullojanov.
“But they’ve become especially acute in recent years
as the population in these areas has grown, the
demand for water has risen accordingly and, in
consequence, there are more and more of these
conflicts.”
In Kyrgyzstan,
political analyst Mars Sariev, said the real problem
was that while there was communication between
national leaderships, this was not transmitted down
to the local level.
“Kyrgyzstan and
Tajikistan are holding high-level talks about water
and energy cooperation, but this isn’t working at
grassroots level,” he said.
Several factors help
to explain why the business of demarcating the
border in the Fergana has proved so vexed.
While Kyrgyz-Tajik
relations have generally been good since both became
independent in 1991, Nur Omarov, a political analyst
in Kyrgyzstan, recalled the Soviet-era clashes that
took place between Tajiks and Kyrgyz – again over
land and water – in the so-called “hoe war” of 1989.
Omarov fears that
there will be more tensions of this kind, not least
because land and water issues were compounded by a
growing demographic imbalance in this part of the
Fergana valley. While the Tajik side of the border
is becoming more densely populated, Kyrgyz areas
like Batken are emptying out as the rural population
moves away, often to jobs in Russia.
“Conflicts of this
kind aren’t going to stop here; there will be more
of them,” warned Omarov.
Yrys Kadykeev and
Jamila Majidova are IWPR-trained journalists in
Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, respectively