31.12.2003 - Source: Minorities at Risk

University of Maryland - Minorities at Risk: Background Information ("Assessment for Uzbeks in Afghanistan") [#30498],  [ID 1199]

"The Uzbeks, who are Sunni Muslims, are ethnically and linguistically Turkic. They occupy the northern agricultural region of Afghanistan, across the border from their ethnic kin in Uzbekistan. They moved into the area during the raids of Turkic people across Central Asia in the sixteenth century. Large numbers of Uzbeks also moved into Afghanistan in the 1920s and 1930s from Central Asia as those countries underwent Sovietization.
In addition to agriculture, Uzbeks have also been involved in Afghanistan’s textile industry since its inception. Uzbek women are renown for the carpets they make, which historically have provided Uzbeks with substantial supplementary income. These economic advantages have also historically led to political advantages for Uzbeks, who have occupied senior positions in various Afghan governments and the civil service. In addition to Uzbek service in the central government, Uzbeks also maintained a good deal of autonomy for their own region (AUTPOW90 = 3), a feat achieved in part due to their economic self-sufficiency. However, Pashtun settlers have made inroads into traditionally Uzbek areas, with major pushes beginning in the 1880s under the first Afghan king, Ahmad Shah, a Pashtun.
The Uzbeks are represented primarily by the National Islamic Front headed by General Abdul Rashid Dostam. Dostam maintained the regional autonomy of the northern Uzbek-populated regions, partially by supporting the Communist government until 1992 (REB92 = 7). (His defection contributed to the Najibullah regime’s fall later that year.) Dostam briefly supported Rabbani (until early 1993), when he withdrew support because of the narrow construction of Rabbani’s government (REB94 = 5). Dostam returned to his stronghold in the northern provinces and effectively ruled them for the duration of Rabbani’s rule. When the Taliban threatened to overrun the country in late 1995 and early 1996, Dostam again allied with Rabbani and his Tajik forces (REB96-98 = 7). The Taliban did gain Kabul, evicting the Rabbani government. However, Dostam managed to stave off attacks on his territories.
The Uzbek are organizationally cohesive, with only one major party – the National Islamic Front – representing them (ORGCOH94 = 7). They are territorially concentrated and closely aligned with their kin across the border in Uzbekistan. Both factors contribute to their cohesive identity (COHESX9 = 5). In comparison to other groups in Afghanistan, they suffer less demographic stress. Although affected by the drought that hit Afghanistan in the late 1990s, they were in a better position to withstand it, in part because they have been less affected by fighting in their home region.
The primary demands of the Northern Alliance, of which Dostam and his National Islamic Front are members, focus on creating a central government with political representation for all of Afghanistan’s ethnic groups in a more federalized structure, with provincial areas having more control over their own affairs. The Taliban rejects this formula, instead focusing on the incorporation of the political opposition (without regard to ethnic formulas) into a Taliban-centered government structure that is more highly centralized. Due to the relatively their relatively rigid negotiating stances, peace processes sponsored by the six-plus-two group (the countries immediately surrounding Afghanistan plus the United States and Russia) have made little progress. Proposals from the exiled Afghan king, Zahir Shad, to convene a loya jirga (the traditional Afghan grand assembly), while accepted by the Northern Alliance and the international community, have been rejected by the Taliban."

Document(s): Open document

31.12.2003 - Source: Minorities at Risk

Uzbeks occupy the northern agricultural region ("Assessment for Uzbeks in Afghanistan") [#30498],  [ID 1589]

"The Uzbeks, who are Sunni Muslims, are ethnically and linguistically Turkic. They occupy the northern agricultural region of Afghanistan, across the border from their ethnic kin in Uzbekistan. They moved into the area during the raids of Turkic people across Central Asia in the sixteenth century. Large numbers of Uzbeks also moved into Afghanistan in the 1920s and 1930s from Central Asia as those countries underwent Sovietization."

Document(s): Open document

1998 - Source: Glatzer, Bernt

Bernt Glatzer: Uzbeks ordered in tribes and clans ("Is Afghanistan on the Brink of Ethnic and Tribal Disintegration?") [#30656],  [ID 1588]

"The fourth important ethnic group are the Uzbek (Uzbeg, Özbeg, Uzbak) of North Afghanistan. They speak their own Turkish language, adhere to Sunni Islam, and are ordered in tribes and clans. Most pursue agriculture and sedentary animal husbandry. Their numbers equal roughly those of the Hazara. One part of the Afghan Uzbek are an autochthonous population, living in North Afghanistan for centuries, who were ruled by their own begs and amirs before the Afghan state extended its control to the river Oxus. The other part of the Uzbek population migrated into Afghanistan after the expansion of the Tsarist Empire and again during the Sovietisation of Central Asia. These Uzbek immigrants did not fuse with the autochthonous Uzbek, but formed a sort of distinct ethnic group under the name of muhajerin ('refugees'). Before 1978 the Afghan Uzbek were known as relatively docile citizens, although anti-Pushtun agitation which had an ethnic target but hardly an ethnic base did exist. During the Soviet-Afghan war, some of the Uzbeks sided with the pro-Soviet government or rather with the pro-minority policy of the new government and were militarily organised under Rashid Dostum's Jawzjani militias; others sided with the Mujahideen, mainly under the Harakat-e Enqelab of Mawlawi Mohammad Nabi Mohammadi, whose leaders, but not commanders, were almost exclusively Pushtun."

Source:
Dr. Bernt Glatzer: Is Afghanistan on the Brink of Ethnic and Tribal Disintegration? In: William Maley: Fundamentalism Reborn? Afghanistan and the Taliban, London 1998, p- 167-181"

Document(s): Open document

1997 - Source:

Library of Congress: Country Studies Afghanistan: Ethnic Groups: Uzbek ("Library of Congress - Country Studies Afghanistan: Ethnic Groups: Uzbek") [ID 1590]

Document(s): Library of Congress - Country Studies Afghanistan: Ethnic Groups: Uzbek