Tajikistan says five Chinese nationals have been killed and five more injured in two attacks launched from neighbouring Afghanistan over the past week, prompting President Emomali Rahmon to summon his security chiefs and call for reinforced protection along the mountainous frontier.
According to a statement from the presidential press service, the incidents took place in Tajikistan’s southern border region and were carried out from Afghan territory.
The first attack, last Wednesday night, involved an armed drone that struck a workers’ camp linked to a Tajik-Chinese gold-mining venture in Khatlon province, killing three Chinese employees.
A second attack near the border on Sunday left two more Chinese citizens dead and additional workers wounded, bringing the total toll from the week’s violence to five dead and five injured.
Tajik authorities have said the drone used in the first incident was launched from across the frontier and was armed with grenades and firearms. The workers’ camp, operated by LLC Shohin SM, lies close to the “Istiqlol” border post on the Afghan frontier, an area where Dushanbe has previously reported cross-border criminal activity, including drug trafficking and illegal gold mining.
Officials have referred to “criminal groups” operating from Afghan territory, but have not publicly attributed responsibility to a specific organisation.
China’s embassy in Dushanbe said the victims were Chinese nationals and advised Chinese companies and personnel to evacuate the border zone “as soon as possible”.
The embassy had earlier urged Chinese citizens to avoid investment or employment in areas adjacent to Afghanistan following the initial drone strike.
Beijing has become a major investor in Tajikistan over the past decade, funding infrastructure, mining and agribusiness projects as part of wider Belt and Road Initiative engagement in Central Asia.
Rahmon convened the heads of Tajikistan’s security services on Monday to review the situation and discuss options to strengthen the border. His office said he had “strongly condemned the illegal and provocative actions of Afghan citizens” and ordered “effective measures” to prevent a repetition of such incidents.
Dushanbe has not disclosed what concrete steps are being considered, but Tajikistan is already working with Russia and other Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) members on a programme to reinforce the Tajik-Afghan border, focused on counter-terrorism and anti-narcotics operations.
There was no immediate response from Taliban officials in Kabul to Rahmon’s latest statement. Following the first drone strike, however, Afghanistan’s foreign ministry expressed “deep regret”, condemned the incident and said it appeared to involve actors seeking to “create chaos, instability, and distrust between countries in the region”. Kabul pledged to cooperate with Tajikistan, including through information exchange and joint assessments, and said Afghan soil would not be allowed to be used to threaten neighbouring states.
Other regional states have also reacted. Pakistan’s foreign ministry condemned the killing of the Chinese workers as a “heinous terrorist attack” and called on the Afghan authorities to ensure that Afghan territory is not used for cross-border violence, citing the incident as evidence of the “gravity of the threat” emanating from Afghanistan.
Russia, which maintains a military base in Tajikistan and views the Afghan frontier as a key security line, has opened an inquiry into reports that drones involved in the attacks may have been operated from areas near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, though no findings have yet been made public.
The attacks come against the backdrop of complex regional diplomacy involving China, Tajikistan and the Taliban authorities. China has recently intensified discussions with Kabul on mining concessions and Afghanistan’s potential participation in the Belt and Road Initiative, while also expanding its investment footprint in Tajikistan, particularly in gold extraction and agriculture.
In parallel, investigations by independent media have highlighted environmental and regulatory concerns around some Chinese-run mining operations in Tajikistan, especially in remote areas close to the Afghan border.
Tajikistan, a secular state whose leadership emerged from a civil war in the 1990s, has often taken a more cautious stance towards the Taliban than other Central Asian governments.
Dushanbe historically backed Afghan Tajik factions opposed to the movement, and relations deteriorated sharply when the Taliban returned to power in 2021, before a limited thaw in recent years that saw cross-border markets reopen and official delegations exchanged.
The latest incidents are likely to test that fragile rapprochement and renew debate within Tajikistan and the CSTO over how best to manage security risks along the 1,300-kilometre frontier.
For now, Tajik officials are presenting the attacks as the work of unidentified groups using Afghan territory rather than as state-sponsored operations, while insisting that Kabul must do more to curb armed actors near the border.
