Tajikistan can't afford to take in Afghan refugees without help -police
chief
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[September 02, 2021]
DUSHANBE (Reuters) - Tajikistan
cannot afford to take in large numbers of refugees and asylum seekers
from neighbouring Afghanistan as it promised to do in the summer, the
police chief of Central Asia's poorest country said on Thursday.
The government of Tajikistan, an ex-Soviet state allied to Moscow and
part of the Russian-led CSTO military alliance, said in July that it
could take in 100,000 refugees from Afghanistan but that it needed to
create infrastructure for them.
"Tajikistan does not have the capacity to accommodate a large number of
refugees and asylum seekers," Interior Minister Ramazon Rakhimzoda said
in comments circulated by his ministry on Thursday.
He said the government had allocated areas totalling 70 hectares along
its Afghan border to receive refugees and has appealed to the
international community for assistance.
"Not a single international organisation in 20 years has provided
practical help in creating infrastructure to take in refugees and asylum
seekers," Rakhimzoda said.
The U.S. exit from Afghanistan and the Taliban's lightning takeover is a
security headache for its Central Asian neighbours and for Moscow.
Tajikistan shares a border with Afghanistan that stretches 1,344
kilometres (835 miles) and runs through mountain areas that are seen as
porous.
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An internally displaced Afghan girl looks on as she attends a class
inside a shelter at a refugee camp in Kabul, Afghanistan May 31,
2016. REUTERS/Mohammad Ismail
Moscow has warned that refugees pouring into its
Central Asian allies would pose security risks and potentially allow
in Islamist militants. It sees the formerly Soviet nations of the
region as its southern defence flank.
Tajikistan says it has given asylym to more than 3,000 refugee
families from Afghanistan, a total of 15,000 people, in the last 15
years.
As of Sept. 1, 80 families with children were on neutral territory
at the Tajik-Afghan border, seeking entry to Tajikistan and fearing
for their lives, according to Interior Ministry data.
(Reporting by Nazarali Pirnazarov; Writing by Tom Balmforth; Editing
by Catherine Evans)
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