‘Ours is a one-man country’, says my driver as we pass yet another gigantic poster of President Emomali Rahmon, the brutal dictator who has ruled Tajikistan since 1994. We are driving along the Pamir Highway from Khorog, the capital of Gorno-Badakhshan, an autonomous region that for decades has resisted attempts by Rahmon and his family to consolidate their political and economic stranglehold over the country.
Residents in Gorno-Badakhshan are mostly Pamiris and Shi’a Ismaili Muslims, while the rest of the country are mainly Tajik Sunnis. President Rahmon has systematically dismantled the power-sharing agreement that ended the country’s civil war in 1997, eroding the autonomy promised to the Pamiris with frequent military offensives.
