The Impact of External Dynamics of the Pamir Crisis in 2018-2022

Chipizubova Polina Andreevna Student, Global Politics Department, Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO University) 119454, Russia, the city of Moscow, Moscow, Vernadsky str., 76, bldg. B chip-polina2002@mail.ru

Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Region (GBAO), often called Pamir in journalistic discourse, is a region in Tajikistan that occupies almost half of the country's territory, but about 3.2% of the population lives in it.  GBAO is a specific region, radically different from the rest of the state for a number of reasons. Firstly, GBAO is located in difficult-to-reach conditions of the highlands, which contributed to the long-term isolation of this region, predetermining not only the isolation of culture, way of life, language, religion, identity, but also the lag in socio-economic development. Secondly, most of the GBAO population professes Ismailism, one of the Shiite trends of Islam with elements of pre–Islamic traditions, and therefore the Sunni majority of Tajikistan perceives Pamiris as heretics at the household level, which leads to their marginalization ^[1]. In addition, during the 1992-1997 civil war in Tajikistan, the Pamiris mainly sided with the United Opposition, which was eventually defeated. Despite the attempts of Tajik President Emomali Rahmon over the past 20 years to build a strong vertical of power, it is not possible to completely subordinate GBAO, largely due to the traditionally significant role of local informal leaders, "authorities" in the region. All these factors predetermined the tense relations between the Government of Rahmon and Gorny Badakhshan, which have flowed into armed violence several times in recent history.

The first large-scale outbreak of violence was the so-called Khorog crisis of 2012, provoked by the murder of a representative of the central government in the Pamirs. The government blamed local criminal groups for the incident and launched a special operation, as a result of which, according to various estimates, from 65 to 150 people were killed, of which up to 100 were civilians (access to reliable information is limited) ^[2]. The conflict was resolved through negotiations with local leaders, not without the intervention of the spiritual leader of the Ismailis, Imam Aga Khan IV, and his entourage (in particular, Yedgor Fayzov). The next aggravation of relations occurred in 2014: presumably in order to eliminate a group of drug traffickers, Tajik security forces began a shootout in the center of Khorog, as a result of which civilians were also injured and killed. The incident sparked anti-government protests, which escalated into armed clashes with government forces ^[3].

In 2018, a new wave of protests swept the Pamirs in connection with the increased military presence in the region and the harsh rhetoric of Rahmon ^[4]. In response to the unrest, the authorities launched a new special operation, which caused fear and discontent on the part of local residents, expressed in the petition ^[5]. The campaign to persecute dissenters resumed: some authorities were removed from office, some died under vague circumstances; there were periodic detentions of Pamiris without a solid accusatory base and the participation of Dushanbe security forces in shootouts with locals, which resulted in a number of armed uprisings. This time, Yedgor Fayzov, who was appointed by Rahmon to the post of head of the region earlier in 2018, again played a key role in resolving the conflict ^[6]. 

However, in the new round of development of this crisis, starting in 2021, the situation began to develop in a different way. A new reason for the conflict was the death of a Pamir man named Gulbiddin Ziebekov under unclear circumstances during detention ^[7]. In addition, Fayzov was removed from his post, and Rahmon's confidant, a native of intelligence, took his place. The military presence in the region has increased again, communications and the Internet have been cut off. During peaceful protests in front of the administration building, fire was opened on the crowd, as a result of which dozens of protesters were injured, and at least three died ^[8].  In 2022, the pressure on GBAO only intensified: according to independent media ^{[9] [10]}, special forces were sent to GBAO to suppress protests (which, according to local residents, were peaceful), firearms and tear gas were used, and protesters in the media were presented as “members of an organized crime group”. Many local media refused to cover the protests due to direct threats from the central government ^{[11] [12]}. According to local sources, arrests were carried out with unprecedented intensity (about 700 warrants in less than a year) not only of local leaders themselves, but also of their relatives and colleagues; many were tortured ^[13]. The security services also published a message to one of the authorities, border guard Colonel Mamadbokov ("Bokir") ^[14], which contained threats to kill hostages if he did not open the road through Bar Khorog; and, despite the fact that the demand was fulfilled, Mamadbokirov was killed, which only aggravated the friction local people with power. The vast majority of experts dealing with this issue agree that at the last stage of the crisis, Rahmon's course towards unrest in the Pamirs became unprecedentedly tougher. The author's hypothesis is that one of the main reasons for this trend is a change in the configuration of interests of external actors. In this regard, the research question of this paper is: "What impact did key external actors have on the dynamics of the Pamir crisis in 2018-2022?".

Russia. Russia and Tajikistan have strong historical, cultural, and economic ties, they are allies in the CSTO and the SCO, so Russia's interest in a stable Tajikistan is obvious. The only question was how Russia sees this stability. At the initial stage of this round of crisis, a number of experts expressed the hope ^[15] that Russia would act as an intermediary between the government of Rahmon and the GBAO protesters, given Russia's special historical ties with the Pamir people ^[16]. This hope was reinforced by the fact that, according to some sources, Russian officials held a number of meetings with Pamiris ^[17]. Until 2022, senior officials of the Russian Federation did not make public statements assessing the situation in GBAO, but in practice provided assistance to the central authorities, which was manifested, for example, in the extradition of members of the Pamir diaspora in Russia to Tajikistan (even with Russian citizenship^[18]). After the meeting of President Vladimir Putin with Emomali Rahmon on 05/16/2022^[19], the Russian course entered the public field: a representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry at a briefing condemned the Pamir "extremists" ^[20]. Let's look at the key factors that predetermined the Russian position. Obviously, the Ukrainian factor has become decisive: in the current geopolitical conditions of Russia, it is important to maintain friendly relations with Tajikistan, and therefore with Rahmon. On international platforms, Tajikistan did not support two UN resolutions on Ukraine ^{[21] [22]}, and also opposed the exclusion of Russia from the UN Human Rights Council^[23]. Rahmon's support in the Pamir crisis is a kind of "payment" for Russia's solidarity. Rahmon, in turn, took advantage of the employment of the international community by Ukraine to implement a hard line in GBAO. In addition, Tajikistan is home to the largest 201st military base of the Central Military District of the Russian Armed Forces, from where, according to some sources, Russia is currently forced to transfer some troops to Ukraine, thereby "exposing" the southern borders^[24]. Related to this is the second most important factor – the Afghan one: against the background of the Taliban coming to power in Afghanistan and the withdrawal of American troops, transnational threats such as terrorism and drug trafficking are sharply escalating. The Bar Khorog road, also called the "Heroin Highway", runs through the Pamir territory, along which heroin, methamphetamine and opiates travel from Afghanistan to Central Asia (CA), Russia and Europe. The prospect of this route falling under the control of extremists seems to be a direct threat to Russia's national security, so it is more profitable for it to tighten Rahmon's control over GBAO. Russia also needs to maintain friendly relations with Tajikistan in order to prevent its complete transition into the zone of influence of China, which is actively increasing expansion in the region. Moreover, in the event of destabilization of the Tajik-Afghan border, the Russian Federation would have to side with Tajikistan and publicly condemn the Afghan government, which would worsen relations with the Taliban, which is undesirable for Russia given its balancing course.

China. Initially, China's interests in GBAO were primarily economic: firstly, a strategically important trade route, the Pamir Tract, passes through the Pamirs, control over which is necessary for China. Interestingly, after a wave of harassment of local authorities in 2022, Chinese financing of the Pamir Highway overhaul in the amount of $ 200 million was announced ^[25]. Secondly, China considers Tajikistan and, in particular, the Pamirs as an easy source of resources, and therefore Chinese FDI to Tajikistan is growing exponentially (in 2010, Chinese FDI was about on a par with Russia, and already in 2020 it exceeded Russian by 10 times ^[26]). Thirdly, China is Tajikistan's largest creditor ($1.2 billion, most of which was spent on large-scale infrastructure projects under the Belt and Road Initiative ^[27]), and, according to experts, Tajikistan is unable to pay this debt in the foreseeable future. There is a widespread opinion ^{[17, 25]} (close to a conspiracy theory, but with a number of empirical evidence) that there is an unspoken agreement between the heads of Tajikistan and China that China will not demand repayment of debt in return for the rights to "develop" the Pamirs – debt restructuring bordering on neocolonialism.  This theory is confirmed, in particular, by China's massive construction of roads and infrastructure projects in the Pamirs with its own money and using its own workers; the transfer of Pamir silver deposits "for temporary use" by the PRC ^[28], as well as rumors that a secret Chinese military base has been located on the territory of GBAO since 2016 (the authorities of this the information is denied) ^[29]. Military cooperation between China and Tajikistan has also intensified in recent years. For example, in 2022, the governments of the countries signed an agreement according to which the PRC and Tajikistan will conduct joint exercises in GBAO at least once a year ^[29]. In addition, GBAO acts as a kind of buffer for China in the issue of radical Islamist formations, since it borders the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, an extremely problematic region for China. Uighur militants, who pose a threat to internal stability, operate in Afghanistan, as well as in Syria and Iraq; and it is important for China to prevent their return to China through Tajikistan ^[15]. Moreover, in relation to the same XUAR, the problem of separatism and extremism is extremely acute for the Chinese authorities, so it is important for China to stop any potential manifestations of these phenomena, including in the Pamirs.

The USA and the EU. After the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan in 2021, the influence of the United States and the West in general in Central Asia has significantly decreased, as has interest in the region. It is obvious that Western countries monitor the development of the situation in Central Asia and in conflicts between authoritarian leaders and protesters fighting for human rights, and side with the latter, since this correlates with the general Western foreign policy agenda. However, using the example of the Pamir crisis, it can be observed that the United States and the EU express their support at the level of public statements rather than providing real assistance to the Pamir people. So, in March 2022, the US Embassy in Tajikistan, in a publication on the social network Twitter, expressed concern about the massive blocking of the Internet in GBAO^[30]. In May 2022, a joint statement was published by the EU Delegation to Tajikistan and the Embassies of France, Germany, the United States and the United Kingdom calling for early de-escalation, respect for human rights and respect for the rule of law^[31]. In the same month, a statement with a similar message appeared on the website of the Swiss Embassy in Tajikistan^[32]. In July 2022, the European Parliament adopted a resolution^[33] calling for the immediate initiation of a fair investigation into the violence committed, and the release of illegally detained journalists and civil society activists. By withdrawing troops from Afghanistan, the United States effectively relieved itself of responsibility for maintaining stability in the region and shifted this burden to other external actors, mainly China^[34]. Despite the fact that the United States continues to promote its initiatives in Central Asia (the New Silk Road, CASA-1000, etc. ^[35]), at the moment their presence in the region is inferior to the Chinese-Russian one, which affects the dynamics of intraregional processes. The main lever of US influence on Tajikistan is now anti-Russian sanctions ^[27], which have a destructive effect on the Tajik economy, including contributing to undermining internal stability and Rahmon's authority.

The UN. The UN also drew the attention of the international community to the worsening crisis in GBAO. In May 2022, the representative of the Secretary-General expressed concern about the outbreaks of violence in the Pamirs and called for a peaceful settlement of the situation ^[36]. A day later, the UN Special Rapporteur on minority issues called on the government of Tajikistan to stop "repression against the Pamir minority." However, as the speaker noted, previous warnings from the UN were not heeded, and the Government of Tajikistan did not respond to the UN letter containing recommendations on de-escalation ^[37].

NGOs. International non-governmental human rights organizations reacted sharply to the events in GBAO. In particular, Human Rights Watch published a detailed analysis of the situation^[38] in the Pamirs and publicly condemned the government of Tajikistan ^[39]. Genocide Watch also drew attention to the escalation in GBAO and issued a warning to Tajikistan, as well as made a number of recommendations to the international community, including the formation of a UN monitoring mission in the Pamirs and the easing of anti-Russian sanctions, since they negatively affect the lives of Pamiris, including^[40]. A group of European human rights organizations issued another statement ^[41], in which they put forward a number of demands to the government of Tajikistan, including an end to violence, the admission of NGOs to the GBAO territory to help victims, an end to pressure on the media, etc. However, at this stage, the access of NGOs and the media to the events in the Pamirs remains extremely limited, the harsh suppression of protests continues, and lawsuits against journalists and activists are underway.

Conclusion. According to the results of the conducted research, it can be concluded that the Pamir crisis is an extremely multifactorial conflict that is becoming more and more internationalized. GBAO is an extremely resource–intensive and promising region for development, which borders Afghanistan, ruled by a terrorist regime, and the Chinese Xinjiang, where the problems of terrorism, separatism and extremism remain unresolved. All this makes the Pamirs a point of intertwining the interests of various external players in the field of economics, security and military-industrial complex and makes the dynamics of the internal crisis in GBAO dependent on the configuration of these interests. After the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, the influence of the United States and its allies in the region decreased markedly, and the resulting "power vacuum" was systematically filled by China and partly by Russia, which contributed to the tightening of the Tajik government's policy towards the Pamirs. It is important for both China and Russia that their ally in the person of Rahmon retain control over this area – for China, its resource potential, strategic importance for the Belt and Road project, the presence of a buffer zone between China and Islamist militants from the Syrian Arab Republic and Afghanistan, and control over trade routes come to the fore. At the moment, Russia, first of all, needs to maintain Tajikistan's solidarity in the international arena in connection with the special military operation in Ukraine, contain the surge of drug trafficking and terrorism on the border with Afghanistan, maintain military-technical cooperation with Tajikistan and at the same time avoid aggravation of relations with the Taliban*. In this regard, as well as against the background of a decrease in the US presence in Central Asia and the general preoccupation of the world community with the Ukrainian conflict, the current stage of the Pamir crisis was marked by an unprecedented level of violence and permissiveness on the part of the central government.

The impact of the recent events of the Pamir crisis on the integration processes in the region is not obvious. At first glance, the fact that the two strongest powers in the region, China and Russia, sided with the Government of Tajikistan in this crisis, and their interests generally coincided, should contribute to strengthening the integration of Central Asia with Russia and China. The GBAO crisis has shown that these countries pursue similar strategic goals: countering terrorism, extremism and terrorism (can be considered a common existential threat), ousting Western influence from the region, and strengthening security and stability. In addition, the support provided to Tajikistan by China and Russia should become a strong argument in their favor on the issue of prolonged "tossing" of the Central Asian states between the western and eastern "camps", which may also encourage the Central Asian states to intensify Eurasian integration. However, if we consider the relationship between the interests of states and their vision of integration at a deeper level, we can notice a number of serious contradictions.  The integration format, which includes China, Russia, and Central Asian countries, and which, in theory, should develop more actively due to the consolidation of the interests of the participants, is the SCO. At the same time, China has recently been increasingly losing interest in this format, betting on bilateral relations, since China perceives the SCO as primarily an economic instrument, and Russia as a political one. Instead, China is actively promoting its own Belt and Road initiative and its various offshoots, in particular, the Silk Road Economic Belt (SREB). Despite the coupling of the EAEU and the SREB ^[35], in fact these projects are competing. Tajikistan, despite lengthy negotiations, is in no hurry to join the EAEU, although, according to many analysts^[42], this only leads to losses and increased dependence on China. Nevertheless, it is unlikely that Russia's reaction to the Pamir crisis will incline Tajikistan to join the EAEU in the near future – Russia probably did not even put forward this condition, since the priority now is to preserve Tajikistan's friendly neutrality on the Ukrainian issue. The next contradiction in Russian-Chinese interests in Central Asia is that China uses the situation in GBAO, among other things, to ensure easy access to hydrocarbons (both from Tajikistan and the Middle East), which can reduce China's need for Russian energy resources. This factor, coupled with China's economic expansion in Central Asia as a whole, forces Russia to participate cautiously in integration formats with China so as not to lose its influence in the region. Many researchers agree ^[35] that there is a certain division of spheres of influence between China and Russia in Central Asia – China is responsible for the economy, and Russia is responsible for security issues, it is important to maintain this sphere of influence and restrain the Chinese military presence in the region. Military-technical cooperation with Tajikistan and other Central Asian countries within the framework of the CSTO is becoming particularly relevant in this regard. At the same time, at the population level of Tajikistan and the Pamirs, in particular, China's actions cause massive concern, because 1). neither their government nor the Chinese authorities inform the population sufficiently, and the population feels "occupied", given that all Chinese projects are carried out using Chinese equipment and Chinese labor 2). The population realizes that the main beneficiaries of the implemented projects are the elites of Tajikistan, not ordinary people. The attitude towards Russia has traditionally been rather positive due to historical and cultural ties, but recently the reverse trend has been noticeable ^[17], including due to Russia's reaction to the Pamir crisis (and the deportation of members of the Pamir diaspora). These factors hinder the deepening of integration at the identity level. Thus, it seems that the results of the Pamir crisis of 2018-2022 may give an impetus to situational consolidation of the interests of the countries of the region and short-term activation of integration, but this is unlikely to give sustainable results in the long term due to the large number of remaining fundamental contradictions. Moreover, the harsh suppression of unrest in the Pamirs did not eliminate their source, but only created a prerequisite for further destabilization of the situation, which could spread to other countries in the region and have a destructive impact on integration processes.

* A terrorist organization banned in Russia