Negotiations on the extended presence of the Russian military bases in Tajikistan are ongoing since September, 2011 and both sides term the negotiation process “long and complicated.” Russian senior military officials regularly make media statements blaming Tajikistan for delaying the negotiations and demanding unacceptable conditions for the new treaty. In return, Tajik senior governmental officials either refrain from public statements or highlight the strategic partnership between Russia and Tajikistan and the constructive dialogue between two countries.

The Russian military bases in Tajikistan were officially opened in 2004 and house up to 7,000 military servicemen. The Russian military presence in Tajikistan reportedly accounts for Russia’s second-largest military contingent outside its own territory, after the 13,000-strong Black Sea Fleet in the Ukrainian city of Sevastopol. According to the existing agreement, the present terms for the base’s deployment in Tajikistan expire in 2014. Under the current 10-year lease agreement signed in 2004, Russia enjoys exclusive use of three military bases and joint use of an air base free of charge.

The polemic around Russia’s military bases in Tajikistan started one year ago, when Tajikistan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Hamrokhon Zarifi told reporters in Dushanbe on July 18, 2011, that Tajik territory cannot be used by foreign military without due lease payment. Some Russian media sources reported last year that Zarifi suggested an annual lease payment of US$ 300 million but that the Russian Government deemed this suggestion “unrealistic.” During their talks in Dushanbe on September 2, 2011, Tajikistan’s President Emomali Rahmon and his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev agreed to sign a formal agreement extending the presence of Russia's military base in Tajikistan for another 49 years. The Presidents agreed that Tajikistan and Russia would settle the terms for the presence of the Russian military bases and sign a new treaty in the first quarter of 2012. However, a draft treaty is still underway.

The controversy intensified after June 26 when the Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Ground Forces, Vladimir Chirkin, made a public statement criticizing Dushanbe’s position in the preparation of an agreement on the extended presence of the Russian military bases. Chirkin blamed the Government of Tajikistan for endangering the continued presence of the Russian bases by “laying down absolutely unacceptable conditions.” Furthermore, Chirkin claimed that local conflicts in Central Asia may arise due to aggravated interstate conflicts related to the use of land, power and water resources by Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan.

The statement was followed by Russian Army General and Head of the General Chiefs of Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, Nikolai Makarov, who told Interfax on July 3 that Russia’s Ministry of Defense will not allocate funds for the development of Russia’s military base in Tajikistan “while an uneasy negotiation process” is ongoing. Makarov continued that “the negotiations are making difficult progress but we hope that common sense will prevail.”

A statement released by Tajikistan’s Ministry of Defense on July 1 said that Chirkin’s politically incorrect statement, forecasting local conflicts in Central Asia, hardly served to promote constructive and good-neighborly relations between the countries of the region.

Russia’s Vice Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, in charge of the defense and space industries, went even further, claiming that NATO’s presence in Central Asia has an impact on the Tajikistan-Russia talks regarding the military base, claiming that as soon as NATO forces leave Afghanistan, Tajikistan will be more “obedient” in negotiations with Russia. “After the withdrawal of NATO forces from Afghanistan, I hope it will happen quite soon, the situation will change substantially,” Rogozin stated on July 5 in an interview to RIA Novosti.

While Russia seeks to put pressure on Tajikistan through public statements, several analysts believe that Tajikistan could be considered an option for the deployment of U.S. military bases after the withdrawal of NATO forces from Afghanistan in 2014. A visit of a U.S. Congressional Delegation to Tajikistan on July 6 seemingly vindicated such speculations. The delegation’s head, Dan Burton (R-Ind.), remarked to journalists during the visit that the U.S. considers Tajikistan as an alternative to Kyrgyzstan for establishing a new military transit center potentially replacing the one currently deployed at Manas International Airport near Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan.