Terrorist Attack or Plot?
Today the central area of Dushanbe again was cordoned off (rus) by law enforcement bodies because of a bomb explosion threat. There was found a suspicious box somewhere close to the ZUM (supermarket) which is located several hundred meters far from the Presidential Palace.
Yesterday there was a bomb explosion which killed one person. Early in the morning a poor street cleaner picked up a plastic bag which exploded in his hands. It happed on the road between Avesto Hotel and the state complex “Kohi Vahdat”. Many people outside Tajikistan know Kohi Vahdat because it is one of the main places for holding international conferences. This is so sad because this explosion was supposed to do nothing with this man. He was doing his everyday work to make both ends meet. That plastic bag was just a regular rubbish for him to be taken away.
Some experts assume that this bomb was addressed to high officials who were supposed to attend a conference on disaster reduction, organized by European Commission. The conference was moved to another place but later that day in the afternoon the conference participants moved to Kohi Vahdat after the law enforcement bodies did initial on-site investigation.
Most of the agencies reported that this explosion happened somewhere close to Presidential Palace without mentioning the exact place. This means that most of assume that this bomb was prepared for a particular person.
Roma at Russian-Tajik neweurasia blog elaborates on that and our friend Ian from Beyond the River translates one excerpt…
Dushanbe is a relatively peaceful city… Who would need to destabilize the situation in the country? Islamists, who are being kept down? The opposition, which doesn’t really even exist? I don’t think so. No one from the general population would take such a stupid action. Maybe it’s a political game–a technology for restraining the dissatisfaction of the popuilation of the country? It’s highly possible. Tajikistan today is in the grip of an unceasing growth in the price of products (some goods have increased in price by an entire 100%) and an unheard-of jump in inflation by 12.4%. Everything is getting more expensive, and nothing is even thinking of getting any cheaper. That’s why it might be necessary to distract the people and the press from the real problems, by organizing a so-called terror attack.
Ian himself thinks that it is ‘certainly a good enough reason to increase US military aid to TJ, or at least step up intelligence cooperation’.
on November 15th, 2007 at 4:05 pm
I should say that my comment about cranking up military aid to Tajikistan on the basis of a pretty questionable “terakt” was sarcastic.
Tajikistan needs roads, not military aid.
on November 15th, 2007 at 5:18 pm
As I already wrote in registan.net, this is most likely one more setup and little ‘let’s-scare-the-stupid-foreigners-so-that-we-can-sell-our-terrorism-problem’ performance.
Same with those who tried to put Saipov’s murder on the Hizb-ut-Tahrir recently.
A EU conference is a soft target, contrary to US facilities who are more heavily guarded. A friend who was on the site just after the supposed ‘terakt’ saw neither a corpse nor blood of the floor. Besides, the explosion was supposed to be outside — while he saw that all the broken glass was laying outside…
Maybe they’ll even find a couple of suckers or bomzhi and make them ‘confess’ that they acted on the orders of the IMU or the IJU. It’s all as thin as hell really.
on November 17th, 2007 at 10:04 pm
Well…hope nobody is opening the way back to early 90s…the country has not ACHIEVE anything so far except the increasing prices.Where soes the government look????Into THEIR pockets i guess.Looks like nobody cares what is our Vatan up to.
on November 21st, 2007 at 7:57 pm
YEar, today everybody thinking their pockets, it’s pity, but we can build this fucking civil society, we should take real bold action not only in Dushanbe, in everywhere. I know it’s not easy but we have not another choice, government does not care wiht our future generation, our future still without, we should do something useful. I suggest to creat one page about how to help to schools of Tajikistan and how to protect human rights in Tajikistan, i hope we can take action, but don’t think about your pockets because we are free volunteers of the world and we can achive this only by togetherness.
Just think about it, pls
on November 27th, 2007 at 11:20 am
Really good and really interesting post. I expect (and other readers maybe :)) new useful posts from you!
Good luck and successes in blogging!