It is 21 years since Tajikistan's 5-year-long civil war came to an end, having claimed between 50,000 and 100,000 lives.
This year, the northern city of Konibodom will host official celebratory events on June 27 that include a speech by President Emomali Rahmon and a concert.
Civil war broke out in May 1992. Half a million people, nearly one-tenth of Tajikistan’s population at the time, had lost their homes. More than 100,000 citizens of the country had fled to Afghanistan.
The United Nations arranged peace talks; appointed a special representative for Tajikistan, Ramiro Piriz-Ballon, to push these talks forward; and created the UN Mission of Observers in Tajikistan (UMOT), military observers sent to monitor the warring factions’ compliance — or more often record their noncompliance — in respecting agreements reached at the peace talks.
For the purposes of achieving peace and national accord in Tajikistan and overcoming the consequences of the civil war, inter-Tajik talks on national reconciliation were conducted from April 1994 to 1997 under the auspices of the United Nations.
Protocols that were agreed and signed in the course of eight rounds of talks between delegations of the Government of Tajikistan and the United Tajik Opposition (UTO), six meetings between the President of Tajikistan and the UTO leader, and also three rounds of consultations between the delegations of the sides in Almaty, Ashgabat, Bishkek, Islamabad, Kabul, Mashhad (Iran), Moscow, Tehran and Khusdeh (Afghanistan) constituted the General Agreement on the Establishment of Peace and National Accord in Tajikistan.
