DUSHANBE, June 18. /TASS/. Considerable concentration of militants affiliated with various terrorist groupings in the areas of Afghanistan adjoining the border with Tajikistan has been reported by border services of the CIS countries, top-rank military said on Thursday at a session of the Council of CIS Border Forces Commanders.
Tajikistani President’s aide for national security, Sherali Khairulloyev told participants in the session one of the biggest tasks today was to prevent the transformation of Central Asian countries into a center of geopolitical confrontation of the world’s largest powers at a time when the threat of international terrorism was getting bigger from one day to another
As he referred to the situation in northern and northwestern areas of Afghanistan, Khairulloyev said the militants were clearly seeking to create hotbeds of tensions and seize state power in the regional nations through the use of force. This would be happening along Aghanistan’s border with CIS member-states, the length of which is 2,340 km.
"If the countries and secret services that have keen interest in the Islamic Caliphate project try and implement it through Afghanistan, the zone of political instability will then protrude to the CIS and China," he warned.
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First Deputy Chief of Tajikistan’s State Committee for National Security, Commander of Border Troops Rajabali Rakhmonali cited the data suggesting that about 1,500 militants had been concentrated on the opposite side of the border.
"Operative information suggests the militants are mostly concentrated in Dasti Archa and Imam Saheb districts of Konduz province," he said at the final press conference.
"The ranks of the militants include members of Taliban, Al Qaida, Islamic State, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, and Ansarullo organization," Rakhmonali said adding that combat actions and tensions continued unabated in the Afghan provinces of Tahar, Konduz and Badakhshon.
Data provided by secret services also points to the concentration of certain numbers of militants in the parts of Afghanistan adjoining its border with Uzbekistan, the chief of Uzbekistani border troops, Nasirbek Usmanbekov said.
"The data we have indicates a certain concentration of militant forces but not in the quantities as in the vicinity of the Tajikistani-Afghan border," he said. "Their concentration near our borders is much, much smaller and our border-guard units have enough strength to repel possible strikes from the Afghan territory."
Presence of a definite but sill unspecified number of militant groupings on the Afghan side of the border was stated by the chief of the Border Service of Turkmenistan, Myrat Islamov.
"We’ve ensured a most reliable protection of our border and we have enough forces and equipment to fortify it," he said.