Clashes last week between armed guerrillas and the security forces of both Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan have caused dismay in the region, especially in the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek where domestic stability remains a perpetual worry.

Accounts of events on May 12 differ on some details, but according to Tajik and Kyrgyz officials, the men started by raiding a frontier post in northern Tajikistan, leaving three soldiers dead and stealing weapons. They then turned up in Batken, a nearby region of Kyrgyzstan, killing two people working at a customs post.

In response, the Kyrgyz military deployed a force of 300 which combed the area and killed four members of the group, capturing a fifth. Four Kyrgyz soldiers died in the skirmishes, bringing the total death toll to 13.

Although officials have suggested the men could belong to any of several radical groups including the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, IMU, and Hizb-ut-Tahrir, no one is certain whether they have any such affiliation.

The men are not the first to make use of the mountainous terrain, porous borders and jigsaw-like political geography of this part of the Fergana valley, where Batken juts into Tajikistan and Uzbekistan is not far away.

In 1999 and 2000, Batken was the scene of raids mounted from Tajikistan by the IMU, who were repelled by Kyrgyz forces and thus prevented from achieving their stated aim of going on to attack targets inside Uzbekistan. Tajikistan’s northern borders are also on the route used to traffic heroin from Afghanistan to Russia and the West.

Cross-border rampage

The events that unfolded on the Tajik side of the border were outlined at a May 16 press conference by security officers in Khujand, the main town of Sogd region.

Lieutenant-Colonel Odinahmad Malikov, the deputy commander of frontier troops in the region, said at 2.30 in the morning of May 12, five men drove up to the Lakkon border post in two cars.

They disarmed the sentry on duty, Private Jamol Rustamov, and then shot dead Senior Sergeant Dilshod Rasulov, and wounded soldiers Narzi Hamrokulov and Ahmad Ismatov, who later died from gunshot injuries.

They then broke into the guardroom and took everything that was there – 17 Kalashnikov assault rifles, a PK light machine-gun and 3,000 rounds of ammunition.

Regional police chief Mirzo Murtazaev said it was clear the arms theft was deliberate rather than opportunistic.

The same morning, a group of armed men drove into Kyrgyzstan through the Ak-Turpak checkpoint, killing a customs officer and his civilian assistant who had stopped them to run a vehicle check, and refused to take a bribe to let them pass.

It is unclear how many there were at this stage, but they all appear to have fitted into one car. Soon afterwards, they dumped the vehicle and hijacked a minivan.

Kyrgyz border guards had already been alerted of the earlier attack on their Tajik colleagues, and mounted a pursuit organisation. There were several exchanges of fire, and the attackers left their vehicle behind and began retreating into the mountains on foot.

As more Kyrgyz troops were brought in – including elite units of the National Security Service and Ministry of the Interior brought in from Bishkek, as well as the border guards – they captured one of the guerrillas, reportedly because he was under the influence of drugs, and found another dead. They also discovered a number of Kalashnikovs, a radio transmitter, sleeping bags and religious literature in the abandoned minivan.

The remaining members of the group were encircled, but because they were higher up the mountains they had better firing positions, so that fighting continued until evening. Government forces killed three more guerrillas, but lost four of their own men, with eight more injured.

Although only five men were accounted for, and just one car was noted crossing the bord