Kyrgyzstan–Tajikistan relations

Kyrgyzstan–Tajikistan relations refers to the bilateral diplomatic relations between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Both countries were a part of the Soviet Union. Kyrgyzstan–Tajikistan relations have been tense in recent years. The two countries fought in border clashes in 2021 and 2022. Refugees and antigovernment fighters in Tajikistan have crossed into Kyrgyzstan several times, even taking hostages.

History
Kyrgyzstan attempted to assist in brokering an agreement between contesting Tajik forces in October 1992 but without success. Askar Akayev later joined presidents Islam Karimov and Nursultan Nazarbayev in sending a joint intervention force to support Tajikistan's president Emomali Rahmon against insurgents, but the Kyrgyzstani parliament delayed the mission of its small contingent for several months until late spring 1993. In mid-1995, Kyrgyzstani forces had the responsibility of sealing a small portion of the Tajikistan border near Panj from Tajik rebel forces.

The greater risk to Kyrgyzstan from Tajikistan is the general destabilization that the protracted civil war has brought to the region. In particular, the Khorog-Osh road, the so-called "highway above the clouds", has become a major conduit of contraband of all sorts, including weapons and drugs. A meeting of the heads of the state security agencies of Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan, held in Osh in the spring of 1995, also drew the conclusion that ethnic, social, and economic conditions in Osh were increasingly similar to those in Tajikistan in the late 1980s, thus recognizing the contagion of Tajikistan's instability.

Beginning on April 28, 2021, a border clash between the two countries broke out, resulting in the death of more than 40 people and displacing 30,000 on the Kyrgyz side. Border clashes erupted again in September 14, 2022, causing at least 94 deaths.