| Publication |
2011.
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| Summary/Abstract |
Since the early 1990s, Tajikistan has become a key hub along international opiates-trafficking routes. Tajik security agencies lack the equipment and the skills to effectively counter drug-smuggling networks. Funding from external donors has partially contributed to the renovation and modernization of these agencies. Since the late 1990s both the United States and the European Union have been providing assistance to the Tajik government in the field of counter-narcotics. After 2001 the commitment of Western donors grew and a number of new projects have been launched. This article analyses the characteristics of such projects and explores the misperceptions and the contradictions embedded in the international approach to the question of the drug trade in Tajikistan. The great majority of drug-control-assistance projects aim at border enforcement and strengthening of interdiction capabilities; the Tajik Army and law-enforcement agencies are the main beneficiaries. This military focus of counter-narcotics, it is argued, has produced few results in terms of stemming the flow of heroin from Afghanistan, while, at the same time, it has generated unintended outcomes, such as strengthening power ministries and contributing to the formation of strategic partnerships between criminal and governmental actors.
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