Tajikistan has reported that five Chinese nationals were killed and another five injured in a series of attacks originating from neighboring Afghanistan over the past week, authorities confirmed on Monday.
China’s embassy in Dushanbe, the capital, issued an urgent advisory urging Chinese companies and citizens to evacuate the border area immediately. The embassy stated that Chinese nationals were targeted in an armed attack near the Afghan border on Sunday. Earlier, on Friday, a separate border incident involving drones dropping grenades killed three Chinese citizens, according to Tajik officials.
Tajikistan, a mountainous former Soviet republic with a population of approximately 11 million, maintains a secular government and tense relations with the Taliban authorities in Afghanistan. The country has previously raised concerns about drug smugglers and illegal gold miners operating along its remote frontier.
China, which shares a mountainous border with Tajikistan, is one of the country’s major investors. There has been no immediate response from Afghan authorities regarding the latest incidents, though Afghanistan’s foreign ministry last week blamed an unnamed group seeking to destabilize the region and pledged cooperation with Tajik authorities.
Tajik President Emomali Rahmon met with heads of security agencies on Monday to discuss strengthening border security. Rahmon “strongly condemned the illegal and provocative actions of Afghan citizens” and instructed officials to take effective measures to prevent such incidents in the future.
Tajikistan endured a devastating civil war in the 1990s following its independence from Moscow, during which Rahmon rose to power. The country remains closely aligned with Russia, which maintains a military base in Tajikistan. Millions of ethnic Tajiks also live across the border in Afghanistan, with Tajikistan historically supporting Afghan Tajiks opposed to the Taliban regime.
