Uzbekistan

At a meeting held in the Uzbek capital Tashkent on Friday, the SCO member countries approved India's proposal to hold on its territory this year a joint anti-terror drill of the competent authorities of the SCO member states, Xinhua news agency quoted SCO RATS as saying in a statement.

Spokesperson of DABS Hekmatullah Maiwandi in a video clip said that Uzbekistan has made the decision unilaterally and they have not been informed. Maiwandi said that Uzbekistan has cited technical problems for the decrease and added that the issue will be resolved in two or three days.

"The planes were forced to land at the Termez international airport. The planes were carrying as many as 585 armed servicemen who were trying to illegally cross Uzbekistan's airspace," said Khayet Shamsutdinov, a spokesman for the prosecutor general's office, TASS News Agency reported. The planes crashed but their pilots safely ejected themselves from their aircraft.

According to Tolo news, 18 passenger planes took off from Kabul to Tajikistan while 28 flights landed in Uzbekistan's southernmost city of Termez on Sunday evening when Taliban fighters were entering the Afghan capital. Most of the passengers were Afghan nationals, including airport and aviation sector employees, the TV channel said.

A spokesman for the Uzbek Defence Ministry told RIA Novosti that, on Sunday night, "The air defence forces of the Air Force of Uzbekistan suppressed an attempt to illegally cross the air border of Uzbekistan by an Afghan military aircraft." It was reported earlier on Monday that an Afghan plane had crashed in Uzbekistan after it ran out of fuel, while it was refused by Uzbek officials to have landed in the country.

Currently, Uzbekistan is in talks with the Afghan side on the return of Afghan citizens to their homeland, Xinhua news agency quoted the Ministry as saying on Sunday. The Ministry added that the overnight amassing of Afghan government servicemen on the Termez-Hayraton bridge on the border over the Amudarya river was now defused.

In a Facebook post, Noor said that the collapse of Mazar-e-sharif was a plot and aimed at getting himself and Dostum surrendered, as per media reports. The only province in the north of Afghanistan, Balkh, fell to the Taliban which brought the entire northern zone under the fighters' control.

Three major factors are likely to shape New Delhi's relationship with Uzbekistan-a resource rich nation with a deep historical connect with India. Separated by only 3000 kilometres, India sees Uzbekistan as a gateway to Central Asia. The country can also become a cockpit of the rivalry between India and China, with Russia as the elephant in the room.