In January 2023, 423,700 foreign nationals, including 2,300 from neighboring Turkmenistan, visited Uzbekistan for tourism purposes, according to Uzbekistan's State Statistics Committee.
Bear in mind that citizens of Turkmenistan need visas to cross the border because the government of Turkmenistan decided to withdraw from the CIS visa-free agreement in 1999.
The common border with Uzbekistan is the longest for Turkmenistan, at about 1,700km, with about 300,000 ethnic Uzbeks living in Turkmenistan and about 200,000 Turkmen in Uzbekistan.
Uzbekistan seeks to increase cross-border trade and plans to establish a free trade zone in the Kungrad district on the border with Turkmenistan.
Turkmenistan, for its part, is building the country's first 600-kilometer toll highway towards the Uzbek border, at a cost of $2.3 billion from the state treasury.
Credits: Eziz Boyarov, Ashgabat
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