Weekly Round-Up - IRINCAS-40: 11-Jan-02
U N I T E D N A T I O N S
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Integrated Regional Information Network for Central Asia
Tel: +92-51-2211451 Ext 484
Fax: +92-51-2211 450
e-mail: irin@irin.org.pk
Central Asia
IRIN-CA Weekly Round-up 40
05 - 11 January 2002
CONTENTS:
AFGHANISTAN: UN expects mass return of refugees
AFGHANISTAN: Japanese envoy meets new government
AFGHANISTAN: Mounting concern over civilian casualties
AFGHANISTAN: Conditions at displacement camps improve
AFGHANISTAN: Information management to play key role in aid work
TAJIKISTAN: Relief effort continues in quake-stricken area
TAJIKISTAN: Afghan refugees staying on
PAKISTAN: Low winter rainfall
PAKISTAN: More cheap credit to the poor
PAKISTAN: IPEC presents plans on eradicating child labour
PAKISTAN: Focus on the growing educational divide
IRAN: UN conference on Afghanistan rehabilitation opens
AFGHANISTAN: UN expects mass return of refugees
The office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is
preparing for a voluntary return of large numbers of Afghan refugees from
Iran and Pakistan after winter ends and the overall situation in
Afghanistan becomes relatively conducive to such a return. "If the
security situation improves and people feel that their security is
guaranteed, then we anticipate that a large number of people will opt to
return," a UNHCR spokesman, Yusuf Hassan, told IRIN on Monday in the
Pakistani capital, Islamabad. The refugee agency is using a figure of up
to one million for planning purposes - about 25 percent of the total
number of Afghans who were either refugees in neighbouring countries or
internally displaced. Hassan said those who voluntarily wished to return
to Afghanistan would be assisted by UNHCR in collaboration with other UN
agencies, including WFP, which might provide such returnees with food aid.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18453&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN: Japanese envoy meets new government
The Japanese Prime Minister's special representative for Afghanistan,
Sadako Ogata, described the country as having "real opportunities" during
a visit to the capital Kabul this week. "The future of the country lies
with the Afghan people," Ogata told IRIN in Kabul on Thursday. The
visiting former UN official held meetings with the leader of the Afghan
interim administration, Hamid Karzai and with Afghan ministers in
preparation for the second meeting on reconstruction on Afghanistan due to
take place in Tokyo on 21-22 January. The meeting will be chaired by Ogata
herself.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18911&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN: Mounting concern over civilian casualties
Pressure to bring about a halt to bombings in Afghanistan continued on
Friday as the interim government led by Hamid Karzai reiterated its
concern over the number of innocent lives lost to coalition air attacks.
"Innocent victims are the real casualty of this war," an Afghan
presidential spokesman, Shaida Mohammad, told IRIN from the capital,
Kabul. "As long as there are terrorists, they should be bombed; however,
innocent civilians must be spared." Mohammad's comments follow Thursday's
announcement by the UN of an unconfirmed but reliable report that 52
civilians in the eastern province of Paktia had been killed in one such
strike alone.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18445&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN: Conditions at displacement camps improve
Conditions for almost 11,000 Afghans at the Mile-46 and Mahkaki
displacement camps in southwestern Afghanistan - both administered by the
Iranian Red Crescent Society (IRCS) - have improved, aid workers told IRIN
on Wednesday. "The situation has certainly improved since December," the
head of mission for the non-governmental organisation (NGO) Medecins sans
frontieres (MSF), Bruno Jochum, said from the Iranian capital, Tehran.
Jochum's evaluation comes in stark contrast to the situation in early
December when thousands of Afghans in search of food and shelter encamped
outside the two sites.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18652&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN: Information management to play key role in aid work
The Afghanistan Information Management Service (AIMS) this week announced
steps to enhance its support for the humanitarian community working in
Afghanistan by various means, including a plan to open an office in the
Afghan capital, Kabul. AIMS - a joint venture between the office of the UN
Humanitarian Coordinator for Afghanistan and the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) - comprises the Humanitarian Information
Centre for Afghanistan and the Project Management Information System
(ProMIS).
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18654&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
TAJIKISTAN: Relief effort continues in quake-stricken area
Emergency rescue teams on Friday were still on the scene two days after a
powerful earthquake struck Tajikistan's eastern Rogun area, killing at
least three and leaving over 50 people injured. Aid workers on the ground
say relief coordination is going well, with the focus now on bringing in
as much assistance as possible. Wednesday's quake, measuring 5.3 on the
Richter scale, destroyed or damaged scores of houses round the Rogun area,
an industrial city of 9,000 inhabitants, 100 km northeast of the Tajik
capital. However, there was no visible damage to the city, Pulatova
maintained, noting the earthquake was shallow in nature, affecting only
rural communities nearby. "Most of the people were at home when the
earthquake struck," she said.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18916&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TAJIKISTAN
TAJIKISTAN: Afghan refugees staying on
A spokesman for the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR) in Tajikistan has dismissed a report saying that
thousands of Afghan refugees on the Tajik/Afghan border had gone home. "We
visited the area last week and know that the population has remained
consistent," Aurvasi Patel, a protection officer for UNHCR in the Tajik
capital, Dushanbe, told IRIN on Tuesday, adding that regular assessments
were being made in the area. Patel's comments follow an AFP report quoting
an Afghan dignitary in Tajikistan, who reportedly made the statement that
UNHCR now describes as incorrect.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18552&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TAJIKISTAN
PAKISTAN: Low winter rainfall
Pakistan's leading weather expert has predicted a below normal winter
rainfall in the country, still reeling from three years of drought.
Although the drought officially ended in May 2001, one of the country's
two main reservoirs remains short of water. Dr Qamar-Uz-Zaman Chaudhry,
Director General of Pakistan's Meteorological Department, told IRIN that
10-20 percent below normal rains were expected this winter though he added
it should not have a major impact on agriculture, the mainstay of
Pakistan's economy. Pakistan suffered from severe drought from 1998 until
mid-2001, when normal rainfall during last summer's monsoon replenished
supplies.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18777&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
PAKISTAN: More cheap credit to the poor
Pakistan's first and only micro finance bank set up last year to provide
cheap credit to the poor, plans to increase loans up to a value of US
$17.45 million, a dramatic increase from loan disbursements of just US
$3.48 million last year. "We have established a network in 30 districts
and beneficiaries are 20,000 households," Ghalib Nishtar, President of
Khushali Bank, told IRIN in an interview on Thursday in the Pakistani
capital, Islamabad. "But now we have the capacity to reach 100,000
households and over a six-year period this is about reaching 600,000, or
ten percent of the six million poor households in the country," said
Nishtar, who started the bank last year.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18788&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
PAKISTAN: IPEC presents plans on eradicating child labour
A visiting delegation from the International Programme on the Elimination
of Child Labour (IPEC) presented plans to Pakistani officials and
employers this week in an effort to end child labour in Pakistan. "We have
developed a time-bound programme, which is a more integrated approach to
eliminating child labour," Gek-Boo NG, director of operations for IPEC
told IRIN on Wednesday in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad. With a view to
eradicating child labour within a 10-year period, the initiative would be
introduced to Pakistani officials over the next few days along with other
ideas on ways of combating the problem.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18653&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
PAKISTAN: Focus on the growing educational divide
Imagine a world of teenagers wearing Levi's jeans and Ray Ban sunglasses,
and partying every weekend to the Spice Girls and Madonna; of young boys
and girls studying and mingling freely, exchanging cards on Valentine's
day and chatting by E-mail. Now imagine a group of young zealots who think
this is a sin, and that martyrdom for the sake of Islam is true salvation;
of young men pushing women indoors and abhorring any form of joy and
festiveness as evil. Both groups are Pakistanis, but products of an
education system which educationists say has collapsed, creating a divide
in society, and which is raising serious concerns over the future of
Pakistan's 140 million people.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18650&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
IRAN: UN conference on Afghanistan rehabilitation opens
A UN Development Programme (UNDP) sponsored conference bringing together
Afghan professionals, entrepreneurs, businessmen and academics opened in
the Iranian capital, Tehran, on Monday, for discussion on the requirements
for recovery in Afghanistan. Following a major international conference on
Afghan reconstruction last November in Pakistan, this week's two-day
meeting focused on first-year rehabilitation efforts and the need to show
an early "peace dividend". The UN estimates there are some 2.3 million
Afghans living in Iran. "Like all members of the Afghan diaspora, many of
these people will play a significant role in the reconstruction of the
country," Bastagli noted.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=18450&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=IRAN
IRIN-Asia
Tel: +92-51-2211451
Fax: +92-51-2292918
Email: IrinAsia@irin.org.pk
[This Item is Delivered to the "Asia-English" Service of the UN's IRIN
humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views
of the United Nations. For further information, free subscriptions, or to
change your keywords, contact e-mail: IRIN@ocha.unon.org or Web:
http://www.irinnews.org . If you re-print, copy, archive or re-post this
item, please retain this credit and disclaimer. Reposting by commercial
sites requires written IRIN permission.]
Copyright (c) UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 2002
distributed by
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Center for International Disaster Information
Volunteers in Technical Assistance
web: www.cidi.org
listserv: www.cidi.org/listsub.htm
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Central Asia www.cidi.org/humanitarian/irin/casia