DUSHANBE. Jan 10 (Interfax) - A Tajik law enforcer came under fire during the incident on the Tajik-Kyrgyz border in the early hours of Friday; the gunfire has stopped by now, and the situation is under control, the press center of the Tajik National Security Committee's Border Forces said in a statement.
The agency said that the altercation between residents of the border area started on Thursday night.
"On the evening of January 9, a large group of residents of the Kok-Tash village, which exists under the jurisdiction of the Aksai village council of [Kyrgyzstan's] Batken region, armed with hunting guns gathered near the house of Kyrgyz citizen Sultanbek Ismailovich Abdulayev and blocked the passage of Tajik citizens on the road to the village of Somoniyen of the Chorkuh jamoat of the city of Isfara," the statement said.
At about 9:30 p.m., Kyrgyz citizens threw stones at the Mercedes of a resident of the Tajik village of Khodzha Ailo and smashed the car's windshield. As a result of the provocative actions of the Kyrgyz citizens, residents of the Tajik village of Khodzha Ailo threw stones at the car of a Kyrgyz citizen at 12:10 a.m.
Following this, Tajik and Kyrgyz law enforcers arrived at the scene, the statement said.
"Representatives of the Isfara 2nd police precinct and the police department of the Batken region rapidly arrived at the scene and brought the situation under control," it said.
At about 2 a.m. on Friday, residents of the Kyrgyz village of Kok-Tash fired a hunting gun into the air but law enforcers and border guards of the two countries "stopped the provocation by joint efforts," the statement said.
"Nevertheless, the personal vehicle of Ikromzod Farkhod, an officer of the Isfara 2nd police precinct, came under hunting gun fire from the side of Kyrgyzstan at about 4 a.m. Luckily, he was unhurt, and the bullet hit the car's door," it said.
The shooting is over in the border area, and the situation is under control, the statement said.
A joint investigative team of Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan is probing the incident in order to establish the motivation and to identify the instigators.
At the same time, the Tajik State Security Committee is concerned about "the increased usage of hunting guns by certain citizens of Kyrgyzstan for provocative purposes which pose a direct threat to the life and health of Tajik citizens, such as in the case of T. Safarova, a resident of the village of Somoniyen of the city of Isfara, observed on December 29, 2019," the statement said.
"In this context, Tajikistan puts the entire responsibility for such cases on relevant agencies of the neighbor state," it said.
Earlier on Friday, Kyrgyzstan reported the evacuation of 254 Dakhma residents following attacks on vehicles of Kyrgyz citizens and the shooting incident on the border with Tajikistan.
Kyrgyzstan reported that unknown individuals hurled stones at cars of Kyrgyz citizens in the Batken region of Kyrgyzstan during the night and then escaped to Tajikistan. Several people inside the cars were injured in the incident.
Later, Tajik citizens threw stones at a Kyrgyz man's house in the Dakhma area. Shortly afterward, border guards and law enforcement officers on their way to the house came under fire from small-caliber hunting rifles from Tajik territory.