Prolonged regional drought created water-sharing difficulties for Amu Darya river states; talks resume with Kazakhstan on dividing the seabed in 2004 as both sides anticipate an ICJ decision on contested oilfields in the middle of the Caspian; demarcation of land boundary with Kazakhstan to commence in 2004.
Transit country for Afghan narcotics bound for Russian and, to a lesser extent, Western European markets; limited illicit cultivation of opium poppy for domestic consumption; small-scale government-run eradication of illicit crops; transit point for heroin precursor chemicals bound for Afghanistan.