Tajikistan on July 24 launched a military operation in the country's eastern Gorno-Badakhshan province against forces loyal to warlord Tolib Ayombekov. The operation is in retaliation for the death of State Committee on National Security regional head Maj. Gen. Abdullo Nazarov on July 21, for which Ayombekov's group is accused. At least nine members of Tajik security forces reportedly have been killed in the operation so far and more than 20 have been wounded. Nazarov is now the highest-ranking security official to be killed in Tajikistan since the August 2010 jailbreak when dozens of opposition figures escaped into the Rasht Valley. His death has prompted the government to cut off communication with and access to the provincial capital, Khorug. Gorno-Badakhshan, a remote and mountainous region, was an opposition stronghold during the Tajik civil war in the 1990s and has remained a difficult area for the government of President Emomali Rakhmon to control. The ongoing fighting there has the potential to spread to other areas and destabilize the entire country.
