Embassy Year in Review and a Look Ahead to 2014

The Following is a post by Robin Ord-Smith, Her Majesty’s Ambassador to Tajikistan.

January seems an appropriate time to look back to 2013 and give the Embassy and state of the bilateral relationship an End of Term report.  And to look forward to 2014 and make some New Year resolutions as well as some predictions and hopes for what lies in store over the coming months.

It is probably fair to say that relations between our two countries are better than they have ever been since the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1991.  Now I know that Ambassadors are supposed to say this, but the level and extent of political, business and cultural contacts have been growing strongly over recent years, culminating in a very busy 2013.  This is not the place to offer a list of everything we were involved in, but let me give a few highlights as examples of what the Embassy has been working on.

2013 saw the first ever visit to Tajikistan by a Foreign Office Minister when Baroness Warsi visited in September and held meetings with President Rahmon and leading Ministers.  This was the fourth visit to Tajikistan by British Ministers within 20 months and coupled with visits from parliamentarians Lord Waverley and Baroness Stern earlier in the year it represented a step up in the level of government and parliamentary links.  Our cooperation on security continued, not only working in partnership with the Drug Control Agency to combat the threat from narcotics, but also between our Ministries of Defence.  In April we signed a Memorandum of Understanding  to allow the removal of UK equipment from Afghanistan across or over Tajikistan; I also opened an English language classroom  in the Tajik Ministry of Defence, sponsored by the UK Government.  And 2013 saw the first ever Tajik officer take a place at the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst.

Trade and Investment has become a key area of Embassy work and 2013 saw 9 companies take part in the first ever UK Trade Mission  to Dushanbe.  It came shortly after Tajikistan’s formal accession to the WTO – a very clear commitment of the country’s desire to further internationalise its economy and encourage investment.  Since the mission we have worked closely with the Tajik Embassy in London and with British Expertise to raise awareness of the opportunities in Tajikistan as well of the challenges and risks.  And we and DFID have continued to engage with our Tajik partners to help improve the business and investment climate.

A joint FCO/DFID/MOD fund has provided over £200,000 for a major project, led by VSO in Tajikistan, to develop cross border trade with Afghanistan, as well as a separate project led by the American Bar Association’s Rule of Law Initiative on advocacy training in the Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Oblast.

DFID Central Asia have continued with their important work in encouraging good governance and a favourable investment climate here. They have also been making progress on rural growth and livelihoods, greater accountability of the state to its citizens, and support for Tajikistan’s labour migrants in Russia and elsewhere.

The Embassy’s Programme budget has continued to support communities throughout Tajikistan.  Working with Mission East in Zerafshan we funded the building of a playground for disabled children, helped Sworde Teppa build a second English and Education Centre in Kubodiyon and supported vocational training at the Dusti Amirkhon Technical College in Sughd.  Other projects continued our work on prison reform and juvenile detention and we have also been helping the National Association of Business Women in Tajikistan improve their networking and IT skills.  Additionally, the entire Embassy spent a day helping to renovate a holiday camp for underprivileged children in Romit. For me this has been some of the most rewarding of all our work.

 So what does 2014 hold and what are our hopes and aspirations?  2014 is likely to prove an important year for Tajikistan.  By the end of the year ISAF combat troops will have withdrawn from Afghanistan, so we intend to continue our cooperation both bilaterally and multilaterally to help the Tajiks build capacity and capability to police their borders and combat the narcotics trade. I very much hope too that we will see a Tajik Ministerial visit to London in 2014 to continue our political engagement.  Baroness Stern will again visit Tajikistan in May to continue her work with the Justice Ministry on Prison reform.  And I hope we will be able to welcome visits by the UK All Party Parliamentary Group to further our parliamentary links, by the British Museum (who provided 7 replicas of pieces of the Oxus Treasure to the new National Museum in 2013) and a second Trade Mission.

As the focus moves from last November’s Presidential elections to 2015’s Parliamentary elections, we will continue to support the media and other partners to disseminate information on voters’ rights and electoral law and practice.  And along with international allies we will be urging the Tajik government to act on the recommendations from OSCE to bring the electoral process fully in line with international best practice.   We will continue also to promote our wider values and human rights beliefs, encouraging Tajikistan to reflect the highest international standards as it seeks to be voted on to the UN Human Rights Council.

I will also be looking to further support training, both English language and in key business sectors with immense potential – like tourism.  This can help both to alleviate poverty and create much needed jobs outside of cities.  And I will be looking for us to engage more through digital diplomacy.  One of my New Year’s resolutions is to tweet more and for both me and the Embassy to double our followers on Twitter and Facebook!

I think overall the Embassy’s report is “solid progress across the board with some significant results.  But more work still to be done”.  I hope that in 2014 we will be able to make further progress, that the bilateral relationship will grow stronger still and that by the end of 2014 the UK Embassy will be widely acknowledged as one of the most effective in Tajikistan.  I may regret opening this up to comments, but what do you think the Embassy’s school report for 2013 should read?