Sources in Badakhshan say Taliban forces and their affiliated mining operatives deliberately targeted the five Chinese citizens who were killed last week on Tajikistan’s soil. According to these sources, clashes erupted between Taliban fighters and Tajik border guards, during which gunfire killed two of the victims. A separate, coordinated drone attack carried out by a network of Taliban-linked miners in the Greater Badakhshan area claimed the lives of the other three.
A reliable source in Badakhshan said that forces under the command of Mullah Juma Fateh, a local Taliban commander in the Darwaz district, opened fire, killing two Chinese citizens and wounding five others. Sources explained that a smuggler had crossed into Tajikistan through the Nusay route. When Tajik border guards opened fire, Taliban forces responded with gunfire. In the chaos that followed, Taliban bullets killed two Chinese citizens and left five more injured.
At the time, a source confirmed to the Hasht-e Subh Daily that the Taliban had launched a landmine-equipped drone from the Greater Shahr area toward Tajikistan. The drone failed to explode. Soon after, Taliban members opened fire on the location where the Chinese citizens were staying in Tajikistan, killing three of them.
Reliable sources also say that the drone attack on Tajik territory last week, which killed three Chinese citizens, was carried out by the Taliban. According to the same sources, Fazl-Khuda Ghorbandi, a partner in the gold mine of Mawlavi Amanuddin, the Taliban governor in Helmand, and a former Taliban commander in Badakhshan during the previous government, was killed in the attack. An informed source said the attack was linked to Fazl-Khuda’s brokerage activities and his rivalry with the Chinese company. However, the Taliban concealed the main details in their official report and released a vague explanation.
Yesterday, the press office of the Tajikistan presidency announced that two attacks launched from Afghan territory over the past week had killed five people and wounded five others. The statement said that Emomali Rahmon ordered Tajikistan’s security institutions to review border conditions and find ways to strengthen border security.
The press office added that Emomali Rahmon “strongly condemned the illegal and provocative actions of citizens of Afghanistan and ordered that effective measures be taken to resolve the issue and prevent such incidents from happening again.”
Meanwhile, Tajikistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated on Thursday, November 27, 2025, that attackers used light and heavy weapons along with a grenade-equipped drone in the Wednesday night assault that week from Afghan territory. The attackers targeted the site of a private company called “Shaheen.” The ministry condemned the attack and urged the Taliban to take serious steps to ensure border stability and security and to prevent future attacks.
After three Chinese citizens were killed and one more was wounded in Tajikistan’s Khatlon province, the Chinese Embassy in Dushanbe called on its citizens to leave the border area. The embassy also asked the Tajik government last Wednesday to investigate what had happened.
At the same time, Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement calling the attack on Chinese citizens in the Tajikistan–Afghanistan border area “cowardly” and strongly condemning it. The ministry said the use of armed drones showed the seriousness of “the threat coming from Afghanistan and the boldness of those behind it.” The statement added: “As a neighboring country that has often suffered from organized terrorist attacks launched from Afghan territory, the people of Pakistan fully understand the pain and sorrow of their Chinese friends and Tajik partners and stand with them in solidarity.”
The statement also stressed that Pakistan has always maintained that “no country should allow its territory to be used for terrorist activities against its neighbors or any other state. The repeated use of Afghan soil by terrorist elements and their continued presence under the protection of the Taliban regime of Afghanistan is deeply worrying for the entire region and the wider international community.”
The Taliban Ministry of Foreign Affairs has confirmed that the attack on three Chinese citizens took place in the “Shamsuddin Shaheen area” of Tajikistan’s Khatlon province. The Taliban did not directly name those responsible, but claimed that early information from their institutions showed that “networks seeking to create unrest, instability, and distrust among countries in the region” were involved. However, findings by the Hasht-e Subh Daily reveal that although the Taliban security team assigned to the case submitted a vague report, Taliban members privately admitted that some of their own members carried out the attack.
Earlier, the Afghanistan Freedom Front (AFF) said in a statement that a drone attack using grenade launchers, along with light and heavy weapons from Afghan territory, struck a camp of Chinese workers in Tajikistan’s Khatlon province. The attack killed three Chinese citizens and wounded several others. The group also urged regional countries and world powers to end their policy of engagement and leniency toward the Taliban.
For some time now, the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan and other political movements have repeatedly warned that Afghanistan under Taliban control has become a center for regional and international terrorism and a battlefield for proxy wars.
These warnings come as the Khorasan branch of ISIS claimed responsibility for a rocket attack launched from Afghan territory toward Tajik border areas in April 2022. The group said it fired the rockets from the Khwaja Ghar district of Takhar province.
Earlier, Ularbek Sharsheev, head of the executive committee of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s Regional Anti-Terrorism Structure, warned that international terrorist groups had increased their activity in Afghanistan and Syria. He said these groups were trying to build “sleeper cells” in Central Asian countries. He explained: “The leaders of international terrorist organizations have not given up on their plans to send militants to Central Asian countries using forged documents through third countries, to carry out terrorist attacks, form sleeper cells, raise funds, and recruit new fighters to expand their ranks.”
You can read the Persian version of this report here:
ترورهای فرامرزی طالبان؛ پنج شهروند چینی چگونه در تاجیکستان کشته شدند؟
