The Fergana Valley, shared by these three countries, is especially vulnerable to violent eruptions over water and ethnicity. In 1990 an outbreak of violence in the Kyrgyz town of Osh on the border with Uzbekistan claims over 300 lives. The violence is provoked by competition for water, limited arable land, and ethnic tensions.
The Tyuyamuyun reservoir in the delta of the Amu Darya is a point of contention between Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Violence occurrs in 1992 over the re-direction of drainage waters and raids by both sides to cut off pipes and irrigation canals. Today, the Tyuyamuyun remains one of several disputed areas in continuing water dispute with Uzbekistan.
Uzbekistan raises regional tensions by cutting off 70 percent of flow downstream, threatening 100,000 hectares and prompting a riot by Kazakh farmers.
Continued serious water tensions between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan lead to the deployment of 130,000 Uzbekistani troops on the Kyrgyz border to guard reservoirs straddling the two countries. Uzbekistan accuses Kyrgyzstan of releasing too much water from the Toktogul reservoir. Kyrgyzstan, through media leak, hints that in case the reservoir would be blown up, the resulting flood would sweep away Uzbekistan’s Ferghana and Zeravshan Valleys.
In summer 1999, Tajikistan releases 700 million cubic meters of water from the Kairakum reservoir without warning its downstream neighbors. Among other effects, this cuts water to cotton crops in southern Kazakhstan, causing significant losses to farmers. At the same time, Kyrgyzstan cuts flows to southern Kazakhstan in retaliation for Kazakhstan’s failure to supply coal under barter agreements.
Tajik guerrilla commander Makhmud Khudoberdyev threatens to blow up a dam on the Kairakum channel if his political demands are not met.
Kyrgyzstan cuts off water to Kazakhstan until coal is delivered; Uzbekistan cuts off water to Kazakhstan for non-payment of debt.
In June 2001, the Kyrgyz parliament adopts a law classifying water as a commodity and announces that downstream countries would be charged for water. In response, Uzbekistan cuts off all deliveries of natural gas to Kyrgyzstan and accuses Kyrgyzstan of failing to honor an agreement to provide Uzbekistan with water in return for oil and gas.
Disputes over unclear borders and poor communications lead to a series of confrontations over water resources in a border area of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. The confrontations with Kyrgyz border guards occur when villagers from Isfara Tajikistan cross into the southern Batken district of Kyrgyzstan to remove a dam blocking an irrigation canal preventing water from reaching the Tajik village of Hoja Alo. The dam is located in an area where the boundary line between the two states has not been…
Uzbekistan cuts natural gas deliveries to Tajikistan in retaliation over a Tajik hydroelectric dam which Uzbeks say will disrupt water supplies. Gas flows resumed after a new contract is signed.