[3] The district consists of seven urban-type settlements (Ravon, Qalʻa, Sarikanda, Soʻx, Tul, Hushyor, Tarovatli) and four rural communities (Sohibkor, Ravon, Soʻx, Hushyor).

Local legend holds that “the territory was lost by a Kyrgyz Communist Party official in a card game with his Uzbek counterpart.” Others say it made sense to assign the area to Uzbekistan because the roads running along the Sokh river connected to Uzbekistan to the north rather than going through the rugged Kyrgyz territory to the east and west of the area in question.

Earlier that year, Tashkent had been rocked by a series of car bombings attributed to the IMU.

The Sokh valley forms a river oasis in the surrounding, barren grassland.

The exclave contains twenty-eight schools, two colleges, three clinics, twelve dispensaries and ten village health centres.