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| Afghanistan-Tajikistan bridge over the Amu Darya (Image: Wiki Commons) |
By Casey Michel
Justified or not, Ashgabat is increasingly concerned about its border with Afghanistan, and the threat posed by ISIS.
The Turkmen-Afghan border is, understandably, one of the least-covered geopolitical divides extant. It’s also one of the most peculiar. For years, the Amu Darya River – one of the points of separation between Afghanistan and the Soviet Union, and now between Kabul and Ashgabat – has been steadily pushing southward, eroding Afghan land and creating unmarked islands along the way. As the years have passed, the split between borders on the map and borders on the ground has only grown.
The border region has been relatively quiescent over the past few years but in 2014 things shifted. Incidents between Turkmen border guards and local Afghan actors, Taliban and non-Taliban alike, flared. Afghans claimed Turkmen nationals were stealing their land. Turkmen guards claimed they were simply protecting their de facto border. Multiple deaths, numerous incidents, and smothered protests have lined the disputed border over the past twelve months, and there’s little sign of restitution on the horizon.
And now there may be other factors to consider along the border. It is clear the Turkmenistani government doesn’t feel nearly as confident against putative Islamist threats as it would like. (An internationally acknowledged regime of neutrality will not stop Islamic militants, after all.) To be sure, the threat that ISIS poses to Central Asia, and to Turkmenistan especially, is significantly overblown by both Moscow and Washington. Even Afghanistan has amped the threat, with President Ashraf Ghani this week saying ISIS presented a “terrible threat” to Central Asia.
Read the full story at The Diplomat