Commenting on a recent meeting in the Tajik capital Dushanbe between senior EU officials and the Central Asian foreign ministers, Mirzo said that Russia had managed to upset the EU-backed Nabucco gas pipeline project and Europe was now seeking new routes for energy supplies.

"It is known that the goal of Europe and the West from setting up the new ’Troika’ is not disinterested. The whole world is currently confronted with problems stemming from the lack of oil and gas. Central Asia - or Middle Asia as Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev still wants to call it like in the old Soviet days - possesses vast reserves of such resources. Europe has been experiencing problems with the transportation of natural gas from Russia. Furthermore, its Nabucco project, which could have brought an end to its dependence, is not going to materialize because Russia has a far-reaching hand...," he said.

He went on to say that Central Asian nations could not "independently" decide how to use or sell their natural resources because of the superpower nations’ struggle for influence in the region.

"As a consequence, Central Asia is deprived of its right to make an independent choice on how to use or sell its God-given gifts. The attempts being made by the region’s countries since the first days of their independence to set up a regional organization have all been unsuccessful," the journalist said.

Nevertheless, Mirzo said there was some hope that the "water wars" might soon end, given the latest trend towards "rapprochement" between the region’s countries.

"Eventually, the countries represented at the Dushanbe meeting came to a conclusion that ’the water wars’ of Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan with Tashkent have to be resolved without mediation from any third country or organization and on the basis of bilateral negotiations. Uzbek President Islam Karimov had earlier emphasized this point as well. Analysts now believe that regional countries’ rapprochement over the issue in question has created an opportunity for a settlement. There is now even talk that a regional organization might soon be established, because Central Asia has a population of 55m and the reserves that captured the sight of all superpower nations. The regional organizations which have been created so far were always joined by Russia and China, which used them to their own advantage," he said.

Meanwhile, the Tajik president has announced Dushanbe’s readiness for "direct" talks over the issue of water resources. In a subsequent meeting with members of the EU Troika delegation, headed by Czech Foreign Minister Jan Kohout, President Emomali Rahmon said Tajikistan was also ready to consider neighbouring countries’ requests for their seasonal water demand, given this year’s great abundance of water resources in the country’s rivers and reservoirs, the privately-owned Tajik weekly Nigoh reported.

"The head of state said Tajikistan was ready for direct talks without the participation of any mediators in order to resolve the water problems in the Central Asian region," it said.

It said the Tajik president warned against "politicizing" the issue of use of water and energy resources in Central Asia, "since building new hydroelectric power stations for generating cheap and harmless electricity is to the benefit of the region’s countries".

The paper added that, during a news conference, the EU officials and the Central Asian foreign ministers "failed to give a clear answer to a question about the future of the minefields laid by Uzbekistan on the Tajik-Uzbek border".