for civil society

We, rep­res­ent­at­ives of civil soci­ety and act­iv­ists of the two coun­tries have united with the
sole pur­pose of help­ing to achieve a peace­ful res­ol­u­tion of the bor­der con­flict on the Kyrgyz-Tajik bor­der of the Sug­hd and Batken regions and con­trib­ute to its peace­ful set­tle­ment. Our appeal is based on the belief in the endur­ing, cen­tur­ies-old friend­ship between our peoples and is guided by the hope for a peace­ful and pros­per­ous future of Cent­ral Asia.

We reaf­firm our strong and com­pre­hens­ive sup­port for the imme­di­ate cease­fire policy by the gov­ern­ments of both coun­tries and the set­tle­ment of the con­flict on the Kyrgyz-Tajik bor­der of the Sug­hd and Batken regions through dip­lomacy and a con­struct­ive nego­ti­ation pro­cess, in which we, as rep­res­ent­at­ives of civil soci­ety, are ready to participate.

We con­demn the dis­sem­in­a­tion of inform­a­tion and mes­sages aimed at escal­at­ing the con­flict, con­tain­ing false facts, as well as calls for hatred and mobil­iz­a­tion of the pop­u­la­tion of both coun­tries for the pur­pose of aggress­ive actions against the peoples of Kyrgyz­stan and Tajikistan.

We con­demn the use of the con­flict by either side to cre­ate polit­ic­al destabil­iz­a­tion with­in the coun­tries and the region.

We call on all rep­res­ent­at­ives of the civil soci­ety of the Kyrgyz Repub­lic and the Repub­lic of Tajikistan to join the con­sol­id­ated actions for the peace­ful res­ol­u­tion of the con­flict to take imme­di­ate and long-term measures.

Thus, we pro­pose the fol­low­ing recommendations: 

Recommendations for immediate action by civil society in both countries:

● Cre­ate an expert group of rep­res­ent­at­ives of civil soci­ety organ­iz­a­tions, experts, journ­al­ists, civic act­iv­ists of both coun­tries to mon­it­or the set­tle­ment pro­cess and res­ults in order to increase the trans­par­ency, inclus­ive­ness of the pro­cess and inform­ing the pop­u­la­tion in order to pre­vent fur­ther escal­a­tion of the con­flict and sup­press pro­voc­at­ive actions.

● Con­duct daily mon­it­or­ing of social net­works in order to pre­vent the spread of hos­tile appeals, pro­voc­at­ive, inac­cur­ate and dis­in­form­a­tion mater­i­als (includ­ing videos, posts, mes­sages on social net­works) that use the lan­guage of enmity and hatred. Pre­vent the
emer­gence and cir­cu­la­tion of such mater­i­als by dis­sem­in­at­ing reli­able inform­a­tion and join­ing the efforts of fact check­ers of both coun­tries to veri­fy the information.

● To unite the efforts of the media rep­res­ent­at­ives of Tajikistan and Kyrgyz­stan in order to provide reli­able cov­er­age of events in the bor­der areas, observing the prin­ciples and
rules of cov­er­age of bor­der problems.

● In their coun­tries, con­duct inform­a­tion work with the pop­u­la­tion and with law enforce­ment agen­cies to pre­vent dis­crim­in­a­tion against eth­nic Kyrgyz liv­ing in Tajikistan, as well as eth­nic Tajiks liv­ing in Kyrgyz­stan or cit­izens stay­ing there for the pur­pose of train­ing and doing busi­ness. We also con­sider it import­ant to cre­ate a work­ing group from among rep­res­ent­at­ives of civil soci­ety organ­iz­a­tions that work with vari­ous seg­ments of the pop­u­la­tion to mobil­ize efforts to pre­vent dis­crim­in­a­tion or hos­til­ity towards eth­nic Kyrgyz liv­ing in Tajikistan and eth­nic Tajiks liv­ing in Kyrgyzstan.

Con­sol­id­ate the efforts of rep­res­ent­at­ives of civil soci­ety in both coun­tries to quickly assess the human­it­ari­an needs of per­sons evac­u­ated from the civil­ian pop­u­la­tion, espe­cially vul­ner­able groups — women, chil­dren, per­sons with dis­ab­il­it­ies, the eld­erly. Based on the assess­ment, mobil­ize (find) resources to provide the neces­sary food assist­ance, med­ic­al and psy­cho­lo­gic­al assistance. 

● Cre­ate altern­at­ive mes­sages and fill the inform­a­tion space with con­struct­ive mater­i­als, includ­ing on the val­ues of peace and humanity.

Long-term conflict prevention mechanisms

● Estab­lish civil soci­ety cooper­a­tion with bor­der ser­vices of both coun­tries in order to cre­ate sens­it­iv­ity to the needs and require­ments of dif­fer­ent groups of loc­al communities.

● Act­ively par­ti­cip­ate in the imple­ment­a­tion of the nation­al action plans of both coun­tries on the imple­ment­a­tion of UN Secur­ity Coun­cil Res­ol­u­tion 1325 (Women, Peace and Security).

● Engage the youth of coun­tries in peace­build­ing and con­flict prevention

● Con­duct joint research and ana­lys­is (mon­it­or­ing) of the situ­ation in order to devel­op recom­mend­a­tions for tak­ing meas­ures to pre­vent the risks
of con­flict situations.

● Ini­ti­ate and par­ti­cip­ate in inde­pend­ent inter­na­tion­al, nation­al com­mis­sions to mon­it­or the imple­ment­a­tion of decisions and agree­ments, doc­u­ment con­flicts and con­duct their sub­sequent leg­al assessment.

We express our strong sup­port for the devel­op­ment of long-term mech­an­isms to pre­vent and respond to con­flicts in the bor­der regions of Kyrgyz­stan and Tajikistan, and emphas­ize the import­ant role of civil soci­ety in pre­vent­ing the escal­a­tion of con­flicts in the future and main­tain­ing peace and secur­ity in our region.

We call on rep­res­ent­at­ives of civil soci­ety who sup­port the above ideas and are ready to con­trib­ute to their imple­ment­a­tion, become part of this inform­al plat­form and join efforts for the sake of peace and devel­op­ment of our coun­tries and Cent­ral Asia.

Each of you can become the peace build­er and only togeth­er we can achieve success!

Peace and good­ness to every­one!
Best regards,
Rep­res­ent­at­ives of the civil soci­ety of the Kyrgyz Repub­lic and the Repub­lic of Tajikistan, who took part in the online meet­ing
on April 30, 2021.
For all ques­tions, please con­tact: mir.kr.tj@gmail.com