DUSHANBE. May 25 (Interfax) - The International Crisis Group (ICG) believes Tajikistan is facing a new wave of armed conflicts.
One of the major threats faced by Tajikistan's security is the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, which is banned in the countries of the region and whose purpose is to create an Islamic caliphate, the ICG said in a report published on its site.
ICG analysts believe it has virtually no combat-ready specialized units that could face new threats from terrorists and extremists. As an example, the experts mentioned the Rasht events that occurred in 2010, when, according to ICG, it turned out that there were "a little more than thirty military men" capable of resisting armed bandit groups.
The report states that anti-government bandit groups are operating in northern Afghanistan, which are paying increasing attention to the countries of Central Asia and are now located 1,400 km from the Tajik-Afghan border.
The experts also said a new generation of armed opposition is emerging in Tajikistan and Tajik society is becoming "increasingly Islamic" and the country's official Islamic Revival Party is becoming "more radical."
"The increased attention paid by the international community for the past ten years has failed to make Tajikistan a safer or prospering place," ICG experts said. "The power is concentrated in the hands of the presidential family. People's displeasure with poverty is being suppressed by repression and is being evened out by the mass departure of labor migrants from the country," the report says. "The state structures are incapable of resolving many problems and dealing with calamities, economic crises and political shocks," the report says.