Joint military exercises are expected to be conducted for Tajik and Uzbek servicemen in the northern Tajikistan and in Ferghana Valley of Uzbekistan next month.
According to the Ministry of Defense (MoD) of Tajikistan, the exercises that will take place in mid-August will be conducted in two stages.
“At the first stage, Tajik and Uzbek servicemen will rehearse coordination and interaction in combat missions against terrorist groups in mountains areas, and at the second stage, they will rehears coordination and interaction in similar combat missions in plains,” an official source at a MoD told Asia-Plus in an interview.
The exercises will involve military personnel along with armored vehicles, artillery and combat helicopters, the source added.
There will be the third joint military exercises for Tajik and Uzbek military personnel since September 2018.
Four-day joint exercises for military intelligence servicemen of Tajikistan and Uzbekistan were conducted in the Tajik southern Khatlon province in April this year. The purpose of the exercises conducted at the Fakhrobod training ground of the Tajik Ministry of Defense was to rehearse cooperation in revealing and removing threats of terrorism. Tajik and Uzbek military intelligence servicemen rehearsed coordination and interaction in combat missions against terrorist groups.
Tajik and Uzbek servicemen conducted their first-ever joint counterterrorism drills, dubbed The Unbreakable Fraternity 2018, in September last year. On September 18, 2018, 600 Uzbek troops joined 17,000 Tajik soldiers and practiced anti-terrorism operations at the Chorukhdarron military training ground in the Tajik northern Sughd province. The troops involved in the exercise used not only light weaponry but unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), tanks, armored vehicles, helicopters and mortars, as well.
Some experts note that joint military exercises between Uzbekistan and Tajikistan underline growing regional awareness that the thirty-year Afghan civil war, fueled by a lethal mix of militancy and drug money, shows no sign of ending anytime soon, and growing belief that collective security initiatives are the best way to at least constrain the chaos to Afghanistan itself.
Recall, Tajik border service chief Rajabali Rahmonali said in May last year that up to 7,000 Taliban militants were believed to have been recently transferred from the south to the north of Afghanistan and were now deployed at 29 training bases in the provinces of Balkh, Kunduz, Takhar and Badakhshan, scattered along the Tajikistani-Afghan border. Rahmonali added that many of these militants were allegedly of Central Asian origin.
Director of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), Alexander Bortnikov, delivering a statement at the 46th meeting of the Council of Heads of Security Agencies and Special Services of CIS member nations in Dushanbe, noted on May 21 this year that about 5,000 militants from the Islamic State (IS) terror group have amassed in northern Afghanistan along its common border with the CIS member nations. “The deployment of terrorist groups to Afghanistan’s northern provinces bordering the CIS states is especially alarming,” FSB chief stressed.
