Foreign tourists arrive in Tajikistan to visit the Pamirs, but to get there is very hard.
The majority of foreign tourists arrive in Tajikistan to visit the Pamirs. The main international highway Dushanbe-Kulma also runs through the Gorno Badakhshan Autonomous Region (GBAO). However, roads in GBAO remain bumpy, despite the “promising projects.”
Over the years of independence, practically all roads from Dushanbe to the regions have been rehabilitated and modernized, except for roads leading to GBAO. The roads from Qalaikhumb, the administrative center of GBAO’s Darvoz district, to other districts of the region remain worndown.
Meanwhile, a number of projects aiming at rehabilitation GBAO roads have remained “promising projects” for many years.
The First Deputy Minister of Transport, Suhrob Mirzozoda, told reports in Dushanbe on July 17 that China is expected to award a US$230 million grant to Tajikistan for rehabilitation of a 92-kilometer road from Qalaikhumb to Khorog.
However, residents of GBAO have taken this news with little enthusiasm. “We have heard promises about the beginning of rehabilitation of the road from the Darvoz district to Khorog for many years. Promises remain promises, but people are forced to get over Khorog off-road,” resident of Khorog says resident Nosir Aliyorov says.
Moreover, people can travel from Dushanbe to Khorog only by car, because regular flights from Dushanbe to Khorog have long been suspended.
The Dushanbe-Khorog highway is a road running for nearly 700 kilometers and the route goes through picturesque mountainous regions of Pamir. Due to the harsh mountain climate, road conditions in many places are bad. Distance from Dushanbe to Qalaikhumb, administrative center of GBAO’s Darvoz district, is some 370 kilometers and the most part of this road is in a very good condition. Meanwhile, the piece of the road from Qalaikhumb to Khorog is in a poor condition.
