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A HISTORY OF INNER ASIA

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Islam’s Ismailite form, a denomination that recognizes the Agha Khan<br />

as its spiritual head.<br />

Capital: Dushanbe (602,000 inhabitants according in 1990); it was called<br />

Stalinabad between 1929 and 1956.<br />

Currency: the rouble.1 rouble100 kopeks.<br />

Appendix 2 335<br />

Geopolitical situation: Tajikistan’s neighbors are, on the south, Afghanistan;<br />

on the east, China (more exactly, her Sinkiang Uighur Autonomous<br />

Region); on the north, Kyrgyzstan; and on the west, Uzbekistan.The<br />

republic’s fairly rectangular shape is broken on the northwest by an<br />

extension in a northeasterly direction, encompassing the city of<br />

Khujand and protruding into the Ferghana valley.This extension, correctly<br />

expressing the ethnolinguistic distribution of the population<br />

(despite the abovementioned Uzbek minority), has nevertheless created<br />

an intricate gerrymander involving three republics – Tajikistan,<br />

Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan<br />

The republic’s four provinces (viloyat) and one autonomous region (viloyati<br />

avtonomi):<br />

Leninobod (Leninabad), capital Khujand; Dushanbe, capital<br />

Dushanbe; also capital of the republic, called Stalinabad between 1926<br />

and 1961); Qurghonteppa (Kurgan-Tiube), capital Qurghonteppa;<br />

Khatlon (Kuliab), capital Kulob; and Viloyati Avtonomii Badakhshoni<br />

Kuhi (Gorno-Badakhshanskaya Avtonomnaya Oblast, “Mountain-<br />

Badakhshan AR”), capital Khorugh (Khorog).<br />

Turkmenistan<br />

Area: 488,100 square kilometers (188,456 square miles).<br />

Population (in 1995): 4,483,300.Density per square kilometer: 8.7.<br />

Ethnic composition (1993 estimate): Turkmen 73.3%, Russian 9.8%, Uzbek<br />

9%, Kazakh 2.0%.<br />

Official language: Turkmen, a Turkic language of the Oghuz group closely<br />

related to the Turkish of Turkey; it is written in the Cyrillic script, but<br />

there is a plan to switch to the Roman script.

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