On the evening of January 9, a large group of armed residents of the Kuktosh village of Aksay rural community of the Kyrgyz Batken district gathered near the house of Kyrgyz citizen Sultanbek Abdulloev, and blocked the passage of Tajik citizens on the road to the Somoniyon village of Isfara’s Chorkuh rural community.
At about 9.30 a.m. the group proceeded to throw stones at a car belonging to a resident of the Khojai Alo village Zafar Azamov, breaking its windows.
In response to the provocation, at 00:10 residents of Khojai Alo village threw stones at a Kyrgyz citizen’s car.
Representatives of the Isfara police department-2 and the Batken district police department arrived at the scene of the incident in time bringing the situation under their control.
On January 10, at about 2 a.m., residents of the Kuktosh village fired a shot from the hunting rifle, but law enforcement officials and border guards of the two countries jointly suppressed this provocation.
Despite this, at about 4:00, a personal vehicle of a police officer of Isfara city Farhod Ikromzoda was shot at from a hunting rifle from the Kyrgyz side. Ikromzoda was not injured.
Currently, the situation is under control. A joint investigative group of the Tajik and Kyrgyz law enforcement agencies is investigating the incident in order to find out its motives and identify the instigators.
Of particular concern are the frequent cases of the use of hunting weapons by Kyrgyz citizens for the purpose of provocations that pose a direct threat to the life and health of Tajik citizens, as had happened on December 29 in relation to T. Safarova, a resident of Isfara’s Somoniyon village.
In this regard, the Tajik side declares that in such cases all responsibility lays with the relevant authorities of the neighboring state.
Press Center of the Border
Troops of the State Committee
for National Security of Tajikistan