On August 13, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees appealed to Afghanistan's neighboring countries to open borders to Afghan refugees.
Against the background of the refusal of Austria, Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands, Greece and Germany to accept Afghans and the pogroms of migrant settlements that have begun in Turkey (albeit only Syrian ones so far), this appeal looks somewhat of a dissonance.
The authorities of Pakistan and Iran have already announced the closure of their borders with Afghanistan, only selectively allowing a few small groups of Afghan citizens to cross the border.
Uzbekistan, which is not a signatory of the 1951 Geneva Convention on the Status of Refugees, immediately stopped the attempts of Afghan servicemen to move to its territory.
Turkmenistan, although it signed the Geneva Convention, has experience in preventing border crossings from Afghanistan.
This problem was already relevant in the 1990s: at the same time, the main principle of the official policy of Turkmenistan was and is to prevent refugees from staying in its territory for any length of time. Since 1992, citizens of Afghanistan have repeatedly crossed into Turkmen territory in large groups, fleeing hostilities, but were blocked by border guards, then the Turkmen authorities put pressure on the refugees, seeking their return to Afghanistan. There is little reason to believe that such a policy will change: in July-August 2021, two Taliban delegations have already visited Ashgabat and, among others, the issue of neutralizing the massive flows of refugees was discussed.
The attitude towards refugees is a rather controversial issue, being not only humanitarian, but also an important factor in the field of security. In 2000-2001, this was clearly demonstrated by the situation on the Tajik-Afghan border. At that time, several dozen refugees were concentrated in the border island zone on Pyanj, and the UNHCR insistently demanded their admission to the territory of Tajikistan. Dushanbe feared that this would exacerbate the already difficult economic situation, aggravated by drought in the southern regions adjacent to the border. There were fears that this would lead to a sharp deterioration in the sanitary and epidemiological situation, intensification of drug smuggling, revitalization of extremist and terrorist groups in the country.
There was every reason for such fears, and the government of Tajikistan simply provided the opportunity for access from its territory to the areas where Afghan citizens are located to all international humanitarian organizations and individual states that wished to provide the refugees with the necessary assistance. Nevertheless, representatives of the UNHCR and a number of other international organizations continued to put pressure on the leadership of the Republic of Tajikistan, citing the lack of security guarantees for their employees when delivering humanitarian supplies to the island zone. However, the position of Tajikistan was actively supported by the Russian side, more realistically than international organizations, which assessed the situation in Tajikistan itself.
Now, apparently, Tajikistan threatens to become a weak point in this issue: the UN coordinator for Tajikistan Sezin Sinanoglu is extremely active with the Tajik authorities (in particular, in the Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Region) taking measures to receive potential refugees, while appealing to that the main responsibility for receiving migrants and creating conditions for them is the responsibility of the state and government. It seems that the leadership of Tajikistan is ready for such a turn of events, as well as for receiving the necessary funds from the UNHCR. Given this turn of events, Tajikistan may turn out to be a weak spot for uncontrolled migration. Another experience of the 1990s can be recalled.
Then Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan, directly bordering on Afghanistan, opened entry visas for certain groups of Afghan citizens, without subsequently extending them, and the refugees were forced to move to other countries - to Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.
In most cases, the UN did not participate in their further fate.
Due to the situation in Afghanistan itself, the topic of Afghan refugees has become part of the general alarmist information flow in recent weeks, which has pretty much swept over the Western media and is largely picked up by the Russian and Central Asian press.
This information campaign consists of approximately the following theses:
- after the withdrawal of the US and NATO troops in Afghanistan, conflicts will sharply increase;
- conflict in Afghanistan will definitely destabilize the surrounding countries;
- US troops are the only stabilization factor in Afghanistan and the region;
- to maintain stability in the countries of the region, it is necessary to preserve (return) a part of the American military presence.
In this context, the diversity of positions of the countries of the region in relation to the situation in Afghanistan as a whole looks interesting.
An analysis of the policies of each of the states shows that even the situation perceived as a threat to the security of the region did not become a reason or even a pretext for any intra-regional coordination (not to mention the loudly declared "regional integration" or at least situational cooperation).
Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan can be united into one group of states that somehow did not particularly react to the intensification of the military conflict in Afghanistan. The Republic of Kazakhstan and the Kyrgyz Republic reaffirmed their commitments within the framework of the CSTO, and also showed little diplomatic activity at the bilateral level - with Russia, as well as the PRC, formally joining the common declarations. Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan were united by two American initiatives: a proposal to deploy in these countries US military facilities withdrawn from Afghanistan, and a proposal to deploy Afghan citizens who collaborated with the United States in Afghanistan and fear persecution by the Taliban in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
Only Tashkent showed a public official reaction to the request for the deployment of American military facilities: in a statement by the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Uzbekistan, it was said that the country's defense doctrine did not provide for the deployment of foreign military bases and facilities on the country's territory. Kazakhstan and Tajikistan at the official level did not comment on this situation in any way. A similar situation occurred in the issue of Afghan citizens who cooperated with the United States, but in this case, none of the countries in the region officially indicated their positions in any way.
Developments in April-August 2021 have diverted attention from other US initiatives on the Afghan issue launched in early 2021.
In February, Kabul hosted a conference "Fighting terrorism and expanding regional cooperation to eliminate terrorism threats", which, in addition to the hosts, was attended by the heads of the special services of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Azerbaijan and the United States.
It is indicative that among the participants were representatives of three CSTO member countries.
And it is necessary to consider this event within the framework of the general American strategy for the formation of the Central Asian region with the inclusion of Afghanistan in it.
We can talk about an attempt to create a new format of cooperation between Central Asia and the United States in the field of security, it can be regarded as an important addition to the diplomatic format of C5 + 1, and in such a delicate, closed area as the activities of special services. At the beginning of May 2021, the commander of the Special Operations Corps of the Government Army (ANASOC), Lieutenant General Mohammad Farid Ahmadi, proposed the creation of common special forces to the neighboring countries of Afghanistan. The author of this project is the special representative of the US President Zalmay Khalilzad, who also discussed it during his visits to Dushanbe and Nur-Sultan in May 2021.
The positions of Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan are united by both the strengthening of military (and border) security measures and parallel contacts with both sides of the Afghan conflict - with the government of Afghanistan and with the Taliban movement. The general position of Uzbekistan in relation to the actual conflict in Afghanistan on June 27 was formulated by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Uzbekistan:
“First, we must understand that there is no military solution to the Afghan crisis ... Uzbekistan became the first country to establish direct contacts with the Taliban leaders. <...> we believe that this issue should be resolved on the basis of a mutual compromise between the current government and the military opposition - the Taliban and others. " Ashgabat's behavior differs from the Tashkent line and is more focused on its specific interests: stabilization at the border, blocking hypothetical refugees, conditions for the implementation of Turkmen projects, supply of electricity, fuel and lubricants and food products to Afghanistan.
Tajikistan took a fundamentally different position, showing its main activity exclusively in the military sphere. At the same time, the leadership of the Republic of Tajikistan, in political terms, took a position of unequivocal support for the government of Ashraf Ghani, ignoring the need for dialogue with all parties in the intra-Afghan conflict. Already in July 2021, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Tajikistan Sirojiddin Mukhriddin made an official statement that Tajikistan has always supported only the official government of the IRA and did not conduct any negotiations with the Taliban militants. Such behavior of the RT leadership contributes to unnecessary confrontation and creates an atmosphere of panic in society. Following its previous tactics, the leadership of the Republic of Tatarstan uses the situation to strengthen the image of an external enemy in the public consciousness. The fact that anti-Taliban sentiments are strong in Tajikistan is also being effectively used,based on ethnic solidarity with Afghan Tajiks.
The aforementioned alarmism has undoubtedly increased markedly in connection with the rapid success of the Taliban in gaining control over the provinces.
The agony of the Ashraf Ghani administration and the unclear prospects for the formation of any effective united anti-Taliban front, of course, reinforce the sentiment in the spirit of "everything is gone."
Against this background, the main thing that is in the general process taking place in Afghanistan fades into the background.
Intrigued observers are discussing the timing of the fall of Kabul, while the main thing should still take place in Doha or on some other international platform.
The main thing that could really take place in Kabul is the resignation in one form or another of President Ashraf Ghani, which is the main negotiating condition of the Taliban, and the transfer of the negotiation process to the formation of a transitional coalition government.
Alas, the positions of the non-Taliban camp after the events of this year will now, of course, be much weaker than they could have been in September last year, when everything came to a standstill due to the desire of the Ghani administration to preserve itself.
Ashraf Ghani and his administration are the main brake on the negotiation process, making it less and less real every day.
At the same time, this government a priori was not able to become a consolidating center for military resistance to the Taliban.
On the contrary, the corrupt leadership and its apparent weakness are the main reason for the success of the Taliban, it deprives the motivation of both government troops and the militias of local leaders.
It is no coincidence that in a huge number of cases, territories and cities are given to the Taliban with little or no military action. The requests of the Kabul government for an urgent convocation of the UN Security Council can be productive only if it helps to start constructive negotiations on the situation in the country, and with this government this is simply out of the question.
The possible very early capture of Kabul by the Taliban does not in the least mean the end of the war, even abstracting from all possible external influences, there are many basic reasons for this. First, it is the Taliban's inability to create a normal system of government: back in the late 1990s, when they controlled almost the entire country, the political and administrative system was rapidly fragmented into semi-feudal formations. Factors of further instability and, as a consequence, instability of the Taliban's power will be both the lack of public support (especially in the cities) and the preservation of enclaves of anti-Taliban resistance. And, without a doubt, the military coming to power will put the Taliban in a difficult position in relations with the outside world.
An important event in recent days is the targeted return of US military units and their allies to Afghanistan.
It is unlikely that this is due only to ensuring the evacuation of citizens of these countries.
This return looks very planned and more like an action to maintain control over the required facilities and, as necessary, keep Ashraf Ghani and his government in power.
* "Taliban" - the organization was recognized as terrorist by the decision of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation of February 14, 2003.
The point of view of the author may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.