War and Insecurity in Afghanistan and Its Impact on Central Asia: The Case of Tajikistan

Abstract

In 2014, withdrawal of NATO military forces from Afghanistan was perceived by Tajikistan as a drastic change of the political landscape. Tajikistan is one of the authoritarian regimes in Central Asia. Tajikistan shares close cultural, linguistic and historical ties with Afghanistan and as well as they have the common customs, traditions, and religion. Russia as a strategic partner of the Tajik government has attempted to support and recently they signed an agreement to extend the 201st Motorized Rifle Division of Russia on the Tajikistan’s territory. Those aforementioned objectives were aimed at creating defensive line for Tajikistan against spill over of security threat and drug trafficking from Afghanistan to Central Asia. The Thesis strives to provide a more detailed discussion concerning the longterm intentions of the U.S. and its state-building practices in Afghanistan. The analysis is mainly focused on the understanding of the state and peace-building in Afghanistan with the main question of has war, insecurity and instability in Afghanistan exaggerated by Tajikistan to justify its authoritarian regime and to garner material benefits from the international community, as well as by the Russian government to maintain and strengthen its hegemony in the post-Soviet Central Asia Using the theoretical concept of “Securitization” sketched out by Buzan, Barry, Ole Wæver, and Jaap de Wilde in 1998 under the influence of Copenhagen school of security studies, this Thesis aims at demonstrating that War, insecurity and instability have been exaggerated by Tajikistan to justify their authoritarians rule and secure funding and by the Russian government to legitimize the presence of Russian troops in Central Asia and to gained material benefits from the drug trade. Discourse analysis (DA) is used to dissect the data obtained during in-depth interviews with the security and political experts and analysts, as well as the employees iii of the Ministry of Foreign affairs. Furthermore, the official statements and speeches of Afghan and Tajik political leader were closely analysed through discourse analysis. The findings of the Tesis divulged that the war, insecurity and instability in Afghanistan are exaggerated by Tajikistan which has (i) direct linkage with the authoritarian regime of this country; (ii), The main aim of the Tajik government is to secure funding from international community and the Russian Federation; (iii) Security threats are exaggerated by Russia to legitimize its military presence in post-Soviet Central Asia, and to that end, (iv) having access to the drug trade and close connection with the Afghan smugglers on the Afghan-Tajik border.