AVAZA, Turkmenistan: The leaders of five Central Asian countries gathered for talks in Turkmenistan on Friday, with the spiral of war in neighboring Afghanistan topping their agenda as US-led forces lave the country.
The talks in the Caspian Sea town of Avaza come as the Taliban challenges Afghan government forces in several large cities after weeks of gains in the countryside, including in provinces next to the three former Soviet ‘stans’ that border the country — Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
Turkmen president Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov called Afghanistan “the question that worries all of us” on Wednesday as state television showed him receiving his Tajikistan counterpart Emomali Rakhmon for bilateral talks ahead of the summit.
Russia, meanwhile, was involved in joint military drills close to Afghanistan’s borders in both Tajikistan and Uzbekistan as a top Kremlin military official flew into the region Thursday to observe the exercises and hold talks.
Fighting in Afghanistan’s long-running conflict began to intensify in May, when US and other foreign forces began the withdrawal due to be completed later this month.
In June, the Taliban captured Afghanistan’s main crossing with Tajikistan, Shir Khan Bandar, while Kabul’s troops have been forced to retreat into both Tajikistan and Uzbekistan in recent weeks during heavy fighting with the group.
The Taliban has insisted that it has no designs on Central Asia, and has established official contacts with both Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan as it casts itself as a government-in-waiting.
But analysts argue that a growing security vacuum in the country can pose its own threat to Central Asia, as well as the region’s growing economic cooperation with Kabul.
Valery Gerasimov, chief of the Russian military’s General Staff, arrived in Uzbekistan for talks Thursday, and to observe military drills that are expected to wrap up next week.
During a meeting with Uzbek counterpart Shukhrat Khalmukhamedov, Gerasimov said the drills took place “to practice actions to repel terrorist threats.”
“The main threat to the Central Asian region today comes from the Afghan direction,” Gerasimov said, noting that Moscow was increasing its supplies of weapons to the region.
The annual summit being held in Avaza is a rare instance of the Central Asian states convening for talks without powers from outside the region, such as Russia, China or the United States.
Central Asia’s leaders meet as Taliban advances in Afghanistan
https://arab.news/pc6pj
Central Asia’s leaders meet as Taliban advances in Afghanistan
- In June, the Taliban captured Afghanistan’s main crossing with Tajikistan while Kabul’s troops have been forced to retreat
Burkina jihadist attacks on army leave at least 10 dead
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast: Suspected Islamist militants attacked an army unit in northern Burkina Faso Sunday, the latest in a series of alleged jihadist attacks that have killed at least 10 people in four days, security sources told AFP.
The west African country, ruled by a military junta since a 2022 coup, has been plagued with violence from militants allied to Al-Qaeda or the Daesh group for more than a decade.
Social media has been awash with speculation that the spate of attacks may have killed dozens of soldiers, but AFP has been unable to independently verify those claims.
The junta, which seized power on the promise to crack down on the violence, has ceased to communicate on jihadist attacks.
On Sunday, militants carried out a major attack on a military detachment in the northern town of Nare, two security sources told AFP.
The previous day, the Burkinabe army’s unit in the northern city of Titao was “targeted by a group of several hundred terrorists,” one of the sources said.
While the source did not give a death toll for either attack, they said part of the military base in Titao had been destroyed.
The interior minister of Ghana, which borders Burkina Faso to the south, said the government had “received disturbing information from Burkina Faso of a truck carrying tomato traders from Ghana which was caught in a terrorist attack in Titao.”
Jihadist ‘coordination’
According to the same security source, another army base in Tandjari, in the east of the country, was also attacked Saturday, and several officers killed.
“This series of attacks is not a coincidence,” the source said. “There seems to be coordination among the jihadists.”
A separate security source told AFP that a “terrorist group attacked the (military) detachment in Bilanga,” in the east of the country, on Thursday.
“Much of the detachment was ransacked,” the source said, giving a toll of “about 10 deaths” among the soldiers and civilian volunteers fighting alongside the army.
A local source confirmed the attack, adding there was damage in the town of Bilanga, and that the assailants had stayed at the scene until the following day.
Despite the junta’s vow to restore security, Burkina Faso remains caught in a spiral of violence.
According to conflict monitor ACLED, the unrest has killed tens of thousands of civilians and soldiers since 2015 — and more than half of those deaths have come in the past three years.
