DUSHANBE, April 11, 2011, Asia-Plus — A fight between Tajiks and Kyrgyz took place near the Kyrgyz village of Kok-Tash on the Tajik-Kyrgyz border, Radio Liberty’s Tajik and Kyrgyz services reported on April 10.
On April 8, a group of young Tajiks reportedly attacked a Kyrgyz police officer who had allegedly beaten a Tajik truck driver two days earlier. Young Kyrgyz retaliated by blocking the only highway that links Isfara with the Tajik exclave of Vorukh, which is in Kyrgyzstan.
Earlier on April 8, two Kyrgyz trucks were stopped and attacked by local youth on the Tajik side of the border, which caused a fight between Kyrgyz and Tajik men near the Kyrgyz village of Tash-Tumshuk.
No serious injuries were reported from the violence.
Khosiyat Komilova, a Tajik correspondent from the Central Asian TV network K+, who witnessed the fight, told RFE/RL that it was between young Kyrgyz and Tajik men. She said she filmed several Tajiks who had been beaten, as well as their damaged cars.
Talks took place on April 8 in Tash-Tumshuk between Kyrgyzstan”s Batken region governor Khaitali Aikynov and Tajikistan”s Isfara district chairman Subkhomiddin Ashirov, who agreed to establish consultative councils of elders, women, and young people to avert further altercations.
Aikynov told RFE/RL that both Kyrgyz and Tajik youth left the scene after the talks were held.
