Crossroads Asia | Economy | Central Asia

Kazakhstan Offers Tajikistan Cooperation, Not a Substitute for Russia

Rahmon’s visit to Astana produced 14 agreements, including a fuel supply framework, but Kazakhstan’s deliveries this year show the limits of what it can provide.

Tajik President Emomali Rahmon left Astana on November 7 with a framework agreement on petroleum product supplies and a roadmap to expand bilateral trade through 2030. Kazakhstan’s fuel deliveries to Tajikistan fell by two-thirds in the first nine months of the year, an indication of the gap between diplomatic commitments and the supplies available.

Rahmon’s three-day official visit produced a joint statement on cooperation priorities and 14 intergovernmental and interagency documents, including agreements on electricity, mining and metallurgy, health care, and pension data sharing, an agricultural roadmap for 2027-2028, and memorandums on artificial intelligence and e-commerce. Kazakhstan will also train personnel for the border troops of Tajikistan’s State Committee for National Security and will back Tajikistan’s first-ever bid for a non-permanent U.N. Security Council seat in 2028-2029, a race against India. The visit builds on the Treaty on Allied Relations signed in Dushanbe in August 2024, which Tokayev ratified in May 2026. A business forum held on the day of Rahmon’s arrival produced 11 announced commercial agreements worth $135.3 million.

Tokayev told reporters that bilateral trade is “confidently approaching” $2 billion. That ambition remains above the latest reported totals: $1.13 billion in January-September 2026, with Rahmon citing growth of almost 26 percent year-on-year. The trade between the two countries is hardly balanced, however. Tajikistan buys up to 1 million tons of Kazakh grain a year and also imports Kazakh flour, liquefied gas, and aluminum oxide, while more than 80 percent of Tajik fruit and vegetable exports went to Kazakhstan as of 2024. In January-May 2025, Tajik exports to Kazakhstan totaled just $31.3 million against $450.1 million in imports. In January-September 2026, Kazakhstan supplied 12.5 percent of Tajikistan’s imports, behind China and Russia.

The fuel framework targets Tajikistan’s most acute vulnerability. Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries and Moscow’s fuel-export restrictions disrupted the regional supply system this year. Although deliveries under intergovernmental........

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