DUSHANBE, May 16, Asia-Plus – U.S. law requires the Secretary of State to provide Congress, by April 30 of each year, a full and complete report on terrorism with regard to those countries and groups meeting criteria set forth in the legislation. This annual report is entitled Country Reports on Terrorism. Beginning with the report for 2004, it replaced the previously published Patterns of Global Terrorism.
The report, in particular, says that working with allies and partners across the world, through coordination and information sharing, they have created a less permissive operating environment for terrorists, keeping leaders on the move or in hiding, and degrading their ability to plan and mount attacks. Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and many other partners played major roles in this success, recognizing that international terrorism represents a threat to the whole international community.
According to the report, through the Regional Strategic Initiative, the State Department is working with ambassadors and interagency representatives in key terrorist theaters of operation to assess the threat and devise collaborative strategies, action plans, and policy recommendations. A progress has been made in organizing regional responses to terrorists who operate in ungoverned spaces or across national borders. This initiative has produced better intra-governmental coordination among United States government agencies, greater cooperation with and between regional partners, and improved strategic planning and prioritization, allowing us to use all tools of statecraft to establish long-term measures to marginalize terrorists.
Despite this undeniable progress, major challenges remain. Several states continue to sponsor terrorism, according to the report.
On Tajikistan, the report says that sharing a 1,400-kilometer border with Afghanistan, Tajikistan offered its limited resources to assist the United States with Operation Enduring Freedom almost unconditionally. Following the deployment of U.S. troops to Afghanistan, Tajikistan allowed its territory and air space to be used for counterterrorist actions. The Tajik government”s main impediment to counterterrorism performance remained its lack of resources. The fact that Tajikistan remained the poorest of all the former Soviet republics, and the ninth poorest country in the world in per capita GDP, puts these funding issues into context.
Tajikistan is not known to harbor terrorist groups, but extremists have transited Tajikistan to and from Afghanistan and Pakistan through the porous 1,400-kilometer Tajik-Afghan border. The United States spent over $5.8 million in 2006 to train and equip the Tajik Border Guards, improve border fortifications, and related capacity-building assistance. These measures will help stem the flow of potential terrorists attempting to cross the border and allow Tajikistan to better monitor its own borders.
Tajikistan prohibited extremist-oriented activities and closely monitored terrorist groups like the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) and extremist groups like Hizb ut-Tahrir. The Government of Tajikistan believed Hizb ut-Tahrir was active in the Ferghana Valley. The Tajik legal system convicted 32 alleged Hizb ut-Tahrir members (19 men and 13 women) in 2006. Analysts believed that the IMU also operated in Tajikistan. Recent press reports indicated that Tajik authorities arrested 30 suspect IMU members in Tajikistan; figures were not available regarding how many of them have been convicted. Tajik authorities arrested five additional alleged IMU members in Isfara. During a search of their house, police claimed that they found 80 kilograms of ammoniac nitrate and four kilograms of aluminum powder.
In May, a small group of armed bandits attacked Tajik and Kyrgyz border posts. The fighters seized several weapons, including 17 Kalashnikov assault rifles, a PK light machine-gun, and 3,000 rounds of ammunition. The date of the attack coincided with the one-year anniversary of the Andijon uprising in Uzbekistan leading authorities to suspect that the IMU was responsible for these attacks. Kyrgyz security services killed four militants during the attack and arrested one other. Tajik authorities later convicted seven IMU members for their participation in the attacks.
Tajikistan participated in the counterterrorist activities of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), the Commonwealth Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), and the CIS Counterterrorist Center.
