BISHKEK/OSH. Jan 14 (Interfax) - The Kyrgyz authorities have no plans to scrap a project to build a motorway bypassing the Tajik enclave of Vorukh.
At talks in Batken, southern Kyrgyzstan, on January 13, Tajik officials proposed suspending the construction of the Koktash-Aksay road, Kyrgyz State Border Guard Service spokesperson Gulmira Borubayeva told Interfax on Tuesday.
"The Kyrgyz side has said that it is not going to shut down this project, and has suggested referring the issue concerning the construction of the Koktash-Aksay bypass road to the Kyrgyz-Tajik intergovernmental commission," she said.
The Kyrgyz-Tajik meeting in Batken also addressed ways to prevent incidents at the Batken-Isfara section of the two countries' border. Apart from that, the sides' border guards signed a protocol pledging to arrange joint patrols and determine their composition and itineraries.
Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan are expected to launch joint border patrols on January 15.
For his part, Kurbanbai Iskandarov, the Kyrgyz government's special envoy for border delimitation issues, told Interfax on Tuesday that a motorway bypassing the Tajik enclave is "intended to help avoid conflicts along the border because citizens of Kyrgyzstan will be able to travel across the republic without entering the territory of Tajikistan."
The place where a Kyrgyz-Tajik incident occurred on January 11 is located in a disputed area along the border, "but the Tajik side has rejected Kyrgyzstan's proposals to put up provisional engineer installations at such sections in order to mark a conventional border," he said.
Earlier reports blamed the specifics of buildings and land use in this area for the current problems.
The Kyrgyz authorities insist that the land plot allocated for the construction of this motorway "belongs to Kyrgyzstan" both by documents and in terms of its actual use.
The Kyrgyz Transport and Communications Ministry has reported that the existing 7.2-kilometer road, which links the villages of Koktash and Aksay, goes through the Tajik enclave. The construction of a bypass road began in the spring of 2013, but was suspended in December 2013 amid Tajik protests.
The Mekenim Batken (My Motherland is Batken) public association issued a statement on Tuesday, demanding that the Kyrgyz authorities "take measures to ensure the security of the population in villages located along the border with Tajikistan, increase security at the Kyrgyz-Tajik border and bring the construction of the road bypassing this Tajik territory to an end."