DUSHANBE, July 19, 2010, Asia-Plus -- Tajikistan is seriously concerned over the social and political situation in southern Kyrgyzstan and actions of destructive forces deserve broad discussion and serious analysis.

Foreign Minister Hamrokhon Zarifi remarked this on Friday while delivering a statement at the OSCE Informal Ministerial Meeting in Almaty, Kazakhstan, according to the Tajik MFA information department.

Security problems in the OSCE area, including Kyrgyzstan, dealing with current challenges through the Corfu Process and a decision on an OSCE summit were on the agenda of the informal meeting of foreign ministers from the OSCE participating States in Almaty.

It is obvious that recurrence of such situations and incitement of ethnic conflicts may lead to fatal consequences and provoke the dangerous round of tension in the Central Asian region and outside its, Zarifi said.

On the Afghanistan problems, the Tajik minister said that fruitful strategy of reconstruction of Afghanistan’s economy was an important factor of contributing to the settlement of the Afghan problems.  He noted that Tajikistan supported development and enhancement of Afghanistan’s economic and technical infrastructure.  Construction of the Dashtijum hydroelectric power plant with capacity of more than 4,000 MW on the Panj River alone would promote renewal of the irrigation system and allow irrigating dozens of thousands of hectares of lands in Afghanistan.

Tajikistan also draws attention to the significance of implementation of large regional projects such as construction of railway link Tajikistan-Afghanistan-Turkmenistan and Tajikistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan and connecting them to Kyrgyzstan and China as well as the regional electricity transmission and trade project, CASA 1000, Zarifi said.  “We also consider it important to involve the Office of the Coordinator of the OSCE Economic and Environmental Activity in the process,” Zarifi noted.

Tajikistan is currently experiencing severe electricity shortages in winter that negatively impacts health and living standards of the population.  Tajikistan does not have enough substantial energy resources (oil and natural gas), and therefore, development of hydropower facilities remains the most important direction of the national policy for Tajikistan.  Developing its hydropower resources, Tajikistan has taken into account interests of neighboring countries in full, Zarifi noted.

In his statement, Zarifi also called on OSCE to take specific steps to promote establishment of an effective dialogue in the region on tackling transportation and transit problems, including monitoring of fulfillment by partners of international obligations on this subject, ensuring of transparency of movement of people and transit cargos through the borders of the participating as well as removal of artificial barriers being created on their ways.