{"id":39153,"date":"2021-02-08T14:10:18","date_gmt":"2021-02-08T13:10:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/?p=39153"},"modified":"2021-02-15T15:15:35","modified_gmt":"2021-02-15T14:15:35","slug":"tajikistan-declares-itself-coronavirus-free","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/tajikistan\/tajikistan-declares-itself-coronavirus-free\/","title":{"rendered":"Tajikistan declares itself coronavirus-free"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In an address to parliament, the president of Tajikistan announced there hadn\u2019t been any new cases of Covid-19 in the country this year. Yet, observers and experts say the Central Asian republic has not been a reliable source of information about the virus.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tajikistan is Covid-free, President Emomali Rahmon announced on 26 January. \u201cToday we are grateful that there have been no cases of coronavirus infection in the country since the beginning of January, that is, I confidently declare that there is no COVID-19 in Tajikistan,\u201d <\/em>he told parliament<\/a>. Rahmon had already claimed<\/a> that the virus had \u201cnearly disappeared\u201d from Tajikistan in his New Year’s address to the nation at the end of 2020. <\/p>\n\n\n

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It is a surprising declaration at a time when other Central Asian states, and countries around the world, are showing high numbers of new infections and deaths from the virus: Kazakhstan is registering over 1,000 new cases a day. In addition, the new variant of Covid-19 originating in Britain was registered in Uzbekistan for the first time on 30 January. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following Rahmon\u2019s speech, the government reopened mosques on 1st<\/sup> February but, as Radio Free Europe \/ Radio Liberty (RFE\/RL) reports<\/a>, said they would have to observe sanitary measures. The president also warned citizens should still respect sanitary regulations such as wearing masks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An unreliable track record<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

The official coronavirus count<\/a> from the Tajik authorities shows 13,308 cases and 90 deaths, with no new cases since 10 January. This contradicts Rahmon\u2019s assertion that there were no new cases in 2021: covid.tj<\/a> shows a dozen new infections between 1 and 10 January.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But even these numbers are in doubt. \u201cTo put it mildly, the Tajik government does not have the best track record of transparency and accurate information surrounding the pandemic,\u201d <\/em>Edward Lemon, a research assistant professor at Texas A&M University and president of the Oxus Society for Central Asian Affairs<\/a>, said.

Read more: <\/strong>Is Tajikistan really free from coronavirus?<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last year, Tajikistan did not record any Covid-19 cases until 30 April, despite local media reporting suspicious deaths<\/a> as early as March. Even after that, an online list by local activists, since then taken down, gave a much higher death toll. In June, RFE\/RL said<\/a> it had been able to verify that 152 people on the list had in fact died from Covid-19. What\u2019s more, using government data, the Tajik media Asia-Plus showed<\/a> there had been approximately 4000 more deaths in 2020 than in 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A leader “who can address any issue”<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere is always a desire from the government to portray itself as being successful and to portray Emomali Rahmon himself as a leader of global standing who is able to address any issue,\u201d <\/em>Edward Lemon said. In this light, Emomali Rahmon\u2019s declaration is a way to reassert his authority after a year of economic crisis and inflation. An analysis shared by the Tajik political scientist and civil society activist Parviz Mullojonov, who sees in Tajikistan\u2019s Covid-19 figures \u201can intentional exaggeration for political and economic reasons<\/em>\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSocial tension is increasing because there are no jobs in the country and Tajik workers cannot go to Russia,\u201d <\/em>Parviz Mullojonov explained. Tajikistan\u2019s economy relies on its labour migrants, for the most part in Russia. According to the World Bank<\/a>, personal remittances represented 28.5% of the country\u2019s gross domestic product (GDP) in 2019. As Russia\u2019s borders closed to prevent the spread of Covid-19 on 18 March, many seasonal workers have stayed in Tajikistan. According to Russia\u2019s central bank, remittances from Russia to Tajikistan have fallen by nearly 40% in the first half of 2020, Asia-Plus reports<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are nevertheless other factors to take into account. \u201cThe composition of the Tajik population could also explain the low numbers,<\/em>\u201d Mullojonov said, pointing out that Tajikistan\u2019s population is younger than that of European countries such as France or the UK. Only 3%<\/a> are over 65, which could mean there are fewer at-risk people and thus more asymptomatic coronavirus cases. In contrast, 18.5% of the UK population is over 65 years old<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Valentine Baldassari<\/strong>

Additional reporting by Clara Marchaud<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

For more news and analysis from Central Asia, follow us on Twitter<\/a>, Facebook<\/a>, Telegram<\/a>, Linkedin<\/a> or Instagram<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In an address to parliament, the president of Tajikistan announced there hadn\u2019t been any new cases of Covid-19 in the country this year. Yet, observers and experts say the Central Asian republic has not been a reliable source of information about the virus. Tajikistan is Covid-free, President Emomali Rahmon announced on 26 January. \u201cToday we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":374,"featured_media":39155,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[3544,3610,1493,3980,3979],"coauthors":[1501],"class_list":["post-39153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tajikistan","tag-coronavirus","tag-covid-19","tag-emomali-rahmon","tag-health","tag-tajikistan"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/374"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39153"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45815,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39153\/revisions\/45815"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39155"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39153"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/novastan.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=39153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}