The guarding of the Tajik-Afghan border by Russian border guards is
in accordance with the Tajik-Russian treaty of May, 25, 1993, "On
Friendship, Co-operation, and Mutual Assistance". I haven't been able
to find the text, but according to numerous news items, the presence
of the Russian border guards was limited to ten years. This period
was not extended because Tajikistan was not satisfied with the way
the operation was financed (half by Tajikistan, half by Russia), it
is argued at
http://news.aif.ru/news.php?id=12606&forprint=1 .
Russia definitely _does_ see the need to continue defending this
border, if only because of the enormous problem of drugs smuggling in
this area - whether or not Afghanistan is more civilised now.
Peter
--- In
BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com, "Lowell G. McManus"
<mcmanus71496@m...> wrote:
> I heard this explained on TV back at the time of the Coalition war
against the
> Taliban regime.
>
> It seems that Tajikistan had lacked the resources to guard its
Afghanistan
> border sufficiently against drugs and terrorism. The Russian
Federation,
> realizing that Tajikistan was its own first line of defense against
both, had
> offered to provide border control down there. Tajikistan was glad
for the help,
> so that's how it was.
>
> I can only speculate, but now that Afghanistan is relatively more
civilized,
> perhaps the Russians don't see quite the need to continue.
>
> I wonder if Russia was assisting Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan at all
on their
> borders with Afghanistan.
>
> Lowell G. McManus
> Leesville, Louisiana, USA
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "aletheiak" <aletheiak@y...>
> To: <BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Sunday, October 03, 2004 8:19 AM
> Subject: [BoundaryPoint] Re: Russian jurisdiction over Tajik border
to
> Afghanistan.
>
>
>
>
> --- In BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com, Christian Berghänel
> <christian.berghanel@s...> wrote:
> > The following news from RFE/RL on September 27 and 30
> tells about the status of the Tajik-Afghan border. Does this mean
> that Russia and Afghanistan share border allthough they're not
> neighbours?