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Central Asia
IRIN-CA Weekly Round-up 4
27 April - 3 May April 2001


CONTENTS: 

AFGHANISTAN: Refugee chief appeals for ceasefire
AFGHANISTAN: UN mediator stresses need for clear peace strategy
AFGHANISTAN: Tokyo awaits response on peace talks
AFGHANISTAN: US senators call for emergency aid
AFGHANISTAN: Conditions deteriorate for displaced on Tajik border
PAKISTAN: Congo fever outbreak under control say authorities
PAKISTAN: Mass arrests in May Day crackdown
PAKISTAN: Islamabad denies increasing aid to Taliban
PAKISTAN: Jemima Khan raises funds for Afghan refugees
PAKISTAN: Conservation expert warns of cataclysmic floods
IRAN: UN warns of worsening drought


AFGHANISTAN: Refugee chief appeals for ceasefire

During his tour of Afghanistan this week, UN High Commissioner for
Refugees Ruud Lubbers met officials of the ruling Taliban and opposition
Northern Alliance to appeal for a ceasefire to facilitate aid to Afghans
displaced by drought and conflict. "His message to both sides in the
Afghan conflict is that the international community cannot be expected to
continue delivering aid to Afghanistan - and take care of the growing
numbers of displaced and refugees - year after year while the parties go
on fighting with no regard for innocent victims," said Ron Redmond, the
UNHCR spokesman in Geneva.

In addition to visiting displaced camps near the western city of Herat,
Lubbers met with the Kandahar governor, Mullah Mohammad Hasan, who
promised to convey his appeal to the Taliban leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar
Mojahed. Lubbers made the same appeal to opposition leader President
Borhanoddin Rabbani in a visit to Faizabad, northeastern Afghanistan, on
Wednesday. He asked for a halt to the fighting to enable relief workers to
reach civilians suffering from the severe drought. According to a UN
spokesman, President Rabbani said he would agree to a ceasefire if the
Taliban did the same. After assessing what UN officials describe as
perhaps the world's worst humanitarian crisis, Lubbers was due to meet
Taliban Foreign Minister Mowlawi Wakil Ahmad Mutawakkil in Kabul on
Thursday, before beginning a five-day visit to Pakistan.


AFGHANISTAN: UN mediator stresses need for clear peace strategy

The UN Personal Representative of the Secretary-General, Francesc
Vendrell, said it was time to develop a comprehensive strategy to bring
about peace in Afghanistan. "First of all, we need to develop very clear
objectives as to what kind of Afghanistan should emerge from this
conflict. And we need a new strategy, because it is not possible [to
achieve] by only having the two warring parties talk to each other,"
Vendrell told IRIN. He said he remained "sceptically optimistic" about
advancing the peace negotiations, despite reports that fighting was about
to resume between Taliban and opposition forces. The senior UN official,
who is responsible for facilitating the peace process, said it would be
important to enlist the support of countries, especially neighbouring
ones, presently engaged in encouraging one or other of the warring
factions. Vendrell added that a greater understanding of the situation
surrounding Afghanistan was also needed on the part of the international
community. The humanitarian crisis could not be solved without a political
settlement, he said.

[For full IRIN story see:
http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN/asia/countrystories/afghanistan/20010427a.phtml


AFGHANISTAN: Toyko awaits response on peace talks

Despite media reports that the Taliban had rejected a Japanese peace
initiative, a Japanese official in Islamabad told IRIN that his country
was still awaiting a final response to its proposal. Masami Kinefuchi,
political counsellor at the Japanese Embassy, said that the Taliban had
given an initial, but not final, reaction. He maintained that a discussion
with both the Taliban and Northern Alliance was needed to obtain final
responses. He hoped that the Taliban would review the proposal in the next
few days, although he stressed that no time-line had been set for their
reply.  Kinefuchi added that no formal response had yet been received from
the Northern Alliance, despite a press release issued earlier this week
announcing its acceptance of Japanese brokered talks.

Since the imposition of the latest Security Council sanctions in December
2000, the Taliban have refused to participate in UN-mediated peace talks.
The Taliban ambassador, Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, said that his leadership
had decided to boycott UN-sponsored peace talks on the basis that the UN
was not impartial, according to a Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) report
issued on Wednesday. However, he also said he would convey the Japanese
proposal to senior Taliban officials in Kandahar, according to SANA. The
Japanese ambassador to Pakistan told IRIN in April that Japan was well
placed to act as a peace broker as it was no longer on the UN Security
Council and could serve as a neutral party to help the Afghan sides meet.

[For full IRIN story see:
http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN/asia/countrystories/afghanistan/20010502.phtml


AFGHANISTAN: US senators call for emergency aid

Thirteen US senators have requested the US administration to allocate US
$30 million in emergency aid for Afghanistan, AFP reported on Wednesday.
Senator Dianne Feinstein and 12 senate colleagues wrote a letter to US
Secretary of State Colin Powell, asking him to allocate more funds for
emergency relief. "The conditions in temporary camps in Afghanistan and
Pakistan are horrendous, and people are dying daily from starvation, cold
and disease," said the letter. "If we fail to act, the world may soon be
witness to a humanitarian crisis of even more massive proportions."
Senator Hillary Clinton was among those who signed the letter. The US is
already the biggest aid donor to Afghanistan, despite its opposition to
the ruling Taliban regime.


AFGHANISTAN: Conditions deteriorate for displaced on Tajik border

A British NGO has expressed concern that conditions of the 10,000 Afghans
displaced, straddled on the Afghan-Tajik border, were "definitely
deteriorating". The latest nutritional survey conducted by the NGO,
Medical Emergency Relief International, Merlin, found early signs of
prolonged malnutrition, caused by a lack of protein and vitamin intake.
Nurse Valerie Powell told IRIN that some of the families were in a
vulnerable state. "People had rice stocks before, but these have run out,
and there is no protein or vitamin intake for many families. We are not at
the stage of severe malnutrition, but the effects of poor nutrition are
escalating," she said. Whereas the displaced at a second site on the flood
plains had animals and access to dairy products and fish, families at a
neighbouring site were resorting to eating grass. Merlin's latest
nutritional survey detected cases of scurvy and a high infant mortality,
with four new-born babies dying since the last visit, she said. Powell
added that protein foods were urgently needed to supplement rice and wheat
that was provided to families by relief agencies last month.

Following a high-level UNHCR mission to the flood plains in February, the
refugee agency decided to suspend its assistance on 13 March, after it
found that aid was also reaching combatants. To avoid a misuse of relief
supplies intended only for civilians, UNHCR has been discussing conditions
for future assistance with the Tajik authorities. Meanwhile, Merlin told
IRIN in April that they and other NGOs were continuing emergency medical
work on the islands, but that vitamin-rich food supplies were a priority
to prevent the further decline of health conditions.


PAKISTAN: Congo fever outbreak under control say authorities

Despite confirming two deaths from the highly contagious
Crimean-Congo-Haemorrhagic-Fever [CCHF], the National Institute of Health
[NIH] told IRIN this week that it had succeeded in controlling the spread
of the virus.  Similar to the deadly Ebola virus found in sub-Saharan
Africa, CCHF is an acute haemorrhagic fever usually confined to remote
parts of Pakistan's southwestern Baluchistan Province. However, the two
latest deaths were of a 65 year-old man, who died in Peshawar,
northwestern Pakistan, on 17 March, and his 30 year-old son, who was
brought to an Islamabad hospital and died 10 days later. A team from the
epidemic investigation cell of the NIH was immediately dispatched to the
original area of infection in Peshawar and found a third male infected. He
recovered after doctors administered a drug known as Ribavarin, which is
effective against the virus. 

The NIH confirmed this week that it was monitoring the situation closely.
Teams had been sent to conduct early warning training with local
communities where the recent outbreaks had occurred, and other areas
thought to be at risk. According to WHO, the first confirmed occurrence of
CCHF in Pakistan was in 1978. In September last year the disease claimed
nine lives in Baluchistan, with sporadic outbreaks reported since then.
The virus is carried by ticks and is transferred to humans in one of three
ways: from a single tick bite, or, through penetration of the skin to the
blood system if a tick is crushed; through contact with blood from a
butchered animal infected with the virus; or through bodily fluids. 

PAKISTAN: Mass arrests in May Day crackdown

The chairman of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), Afrasiyab
Khattak, condemned the military government's crackdown to prevent a May
Day celebration taking place by pro-democracy activists in the southern
city of Karachi. Khattak told IRIN that this sent a strange message. "This
government is giving signals of marching towards democracy while, in fact,
it is moving in the opposite direction towards a more authoritarian
government." 

Opposition and official versions of the number of arrests differed, with
one local newspaper reporting over 1,500 politicians, labour leaders and
activists arrested in the space of 24 hours. Khattak described as "even
more disturbing" the denial of access to Karachi by the authorities. The
Pakistani newspaper 'The News' reported the interception and arrest of
83-year-old Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan, leader of the 16-party opposition
Alliance for the Restoration of Democracy (ARD), as he arrived at Karachi
airport last weekend. Despite the rigorous security measures, activists
succeeded in staging rallies by using surprise tactics, appearing at
different venues across the city to stage anti-government protests. 'The
News' reported on Wednesday that Chief Executive General Pervez Musharraf
had advised politicians to stay at home now as the government would not
tolerate instability. 

[For full IRIN story see:
http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN/asia/countrystories/pakistan/20010430.phtml


PAKISTAN: Islamabad denies increasing aid to Taliban

The government of Pakistan on Tuesday denied that it was backing the
Taliban Islamic Movement of Afghanistan with increased military
assistance, as alleged by a US State Department report released on Monday.
Maj-Gen Rashid Qureshi, spokesman for Pakistani Chief Executive General
Pervez Musharraf, told IRIN that this was totally incorrect. "I truly
question the information and reasoning behind this. There seems to be a
concerted effort by many western countries to isolate Afghanistan
further," he said.  The State Department report, entitled "Patterns of
Global Terrorism", accused Pakistan of increasing its military support to
the Taliban, as well as to Kashmiri militant groups active in
Indian-occupied Kashmir. 

[For full IRIN story see:
http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN/asia/countrystories/pakistan/20010501.phtml


PAKISTAN: Jemima Khan raises funds for Afghan refugees

An appeal launched by British celebrity, Jemima Khan, has raised US
$86,500 to help Afghan refugees at Jalozai camp in Peshawar, in Pakistan's
North-West Frontier Province (NWFP). As a result of two articles written
by Khan about the refugees that appeared in British publications,
donations have been pouring in over the past two weeks. More than US
$7,000 had been coming in daily, Khan told IRIN. Khan visited Jalozai in
March and was appalled by the conditions in which the 80,000 refugees were
living. "I was horrified by what I saw and the apathetic reaction to the
problem," explained Khan, talking about her articles. "However, I knew
that people reading them would feel helpless if they couldn't contribute
in some way, so I very quickly set up a bank account and a hotline for
donations," she said. 

Pakistan says it is unable to cope with the recent influx of Afghans and
has halted formal registration of new refugees, denying them proper
assistance. The 14,000 families in Jalozai have been sheltering under
makeshift plastic sheets. Khan said that providing shelter for the
refugees would be the "first priority".  Meanwhile, the World Food
Programme (WFP) announced on Wednesday that it was purchasing 2,143 mt of
surplus Pakistani wheat to help feed Afghan refugees in camps near
Peshawar. WFP Programme Adviser Rahman Chowdhury said the agency planned
to bring over 12,000 mt of food to 65,000 Afghan refugees at a cost of US
$4.87 million. "This operation will help the government of Pakistan cope
with this mounting burden," he said. 

[For full IRIN story see:
http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN/asia/countrystories/pakistan/20010430a.phtml

PAKISTAN: Conservation expert warns of cataclysmic floods

Despite the current water shortage, severe flooding in some parts of
Pakstan is "a virtual certainty", World Wildlife Fund (WWF)
conservationist Richard Garstang told IRIN. "I am going to make a terrible
prediction, but I am afraid it's going to happen. During the current
extended drought cycle, the degree to which the alpine pastures have been
hammered by livestock from various origins, including refugee communities,
has resulted in a loss of ground cover," said Garstang. He went on to
predict flash floods and landslides that would be worse than those in Azad
Kashmir and parts of the NWFP in September 1992. Garstang warned that the
potential impact of renewed flooding would be "far more devastating", as
the capacity of the ground to hold water had greatly diminished. He
predicted that the floods would occur some time within the next four
years. 

[For full IRIN story see:
http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN/asia/countrystories/pakistan/20010427a.phtml

IRAN: UN warns of worsening drought

The drought in Iran is set to continue into its third year, causing
widespread water shortages and adversely affecting agriculture, livestock
and the country's wildlife, the United Nations resident coordinator in
Iran, Francesco Bastagli, told IRIN on Wednesday.  "Recent precipitation
figures are cause for serious concern," Bastagli said. The UN
coordinator's office predicts that the drought will continue in Iran's
eastern, southern and central provinces. While affecting fewer regions
this year, the impact of the drought would be far greater in communities
which had not recovered from the two previous years, the UN said. 

The warning comes in the wake of an announcement last week by the deputy
minister of energy for water resources, Rasul Zargar, who predicted a
water crisis for 12 of the country's 28 provinces. Zargar said water
levels in the country's main rivers were down by 45 percent. He attributed
the three-year drought to global warming, and said that the water crisis
would affect parts of the capital, Tehran. 

Islamabad, 3 May,2001


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