FREEFORUM

First post. Signal only at the truck stop. Two nights shooting at the wells west of here. Uzbek guards and our riders. Nobody knows who first. Herders moving flocks back from the line in the dark. Not rumour, I heard it with my ears.

Welcome. Nothing on OneNews, nothing on IradOdin. In this country that's a kind of confirmation.

People in my office say Iradiya cancelled today's Tashkent charter "for technical reasons". Technically: guns?

HEARD: twelve dead, the army is going west, Ruslan himself in command.

Which army? The State Defense Corps doesn't go onto the tribal side and neither does the Gendarmerie. The western desert is El-Choro country. If a column from Talas "went west" it would be a much bigger story than any border shooting.

Logged.

No army from Talas. Only riders. Not twelve dead. I do not know how many hurt. Nobody here says numbers. Numbers make revenge.

These are not our valleys, but the elders up here talk about it at every fire.

The trails and wells in the west are older than any line drawn in Tashkent or Moscow. Uzbek herders water at some of the same wells. If you take a well from a herder in June, you take his flock in August. I pray for cool heads, and I hope the Uzbek herders are speaking to their own guards the way our herders are speaking to our riders.

Nothing in the news here, of course. Is there a way for the diaspora to help the herders' families? Not politics. Just practical things.

Herald this morning: El-Choro patrols and Uzbek guards exchanged fire over grazing trails and boreholes, nobody gives casualty figures, Iradiya waiting for Tashkent landing permits. So the "technical reasons" were a permit.

western_wells: right. The twelve and the army: not.

cousins_wife_says: 0.5 / 4.

What they're saying in Nurzhan: Talas doesn't want a war on the border, but Talas doesn't mind the clans being busy with the Uzbeks either. Busy clans, quiet Kurultai. I'm not saying it's true. I'm saying it's what my uncle says over the beer.

I remember 1992, when every rumour of shooting became three rumours by morning, and the morning ones were always worse. Please, everyone, be careful what you repeat here. These are real families on both sides of the line.

In 1992 the first number was always wrong. The second number also. Wait for the third.

Now it is in the paper: Herald. Numbers match what I said. Nobody hurt on our side. That part they got right too.

Quiet four nights. Our elders and Uzbek officers met at the old well by the road. UN men watching. Everybody drank tea and nobody smiled. That is good. When they smile, it is bad.

Water and grass. Every war in this country is about water and grass. The rest is speeches.