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Central Asia
IRIN-CA Weekly Round-up 52
30 March - 05 April 2002


CONTENTS:

AFGHANISTAN: Locals rehabilitate roads and rivers in Kabul
AFGHANISTAN: Focus on major repatriation accord
AFGHANISTAN: Former military officers welcome "new" army
AFGHANISTAN: UN optimistic after government moves on opium
AFGHANISTAN: 39 feared dead in Faryab floods
AFGHANISTAN: WFP calls for more funds to sustain projects
AFGHANISTAN: Musharraf's visit "a new chapter" in relations
AFGHANISTAN: Turkey prepares to lead ISAF
AFGHANISTAN: Thousands of earthquake victims still in need
AFGHANISTAN: Popular culture begins returning to Kandahar
AFGHANISTAN: Refugee repatriation tops 150,000
AFGHANISTAN: Former King to return on confidence-boosting trip
AFGHANISTAN: Focus on female opium addiction
AFGHANISTAN: Mixed reaction to grand council announcement
AFGHANISTAN: Tremors continuing as aid flows in


AFGHANISTAN: Locals rehabilitate roads and rivers in Kabul

Now armed with a spade, a former Northern Alliance commander, Amir
Mohammad, from central Parvan Province, found employment a few months
after returning to the Afghan capital, Kabul. "I am happy to be working
here and proud to be involved in the rebuilding of my county," he told
IRIN. Mohammad is one of 500 Afghans, paid two dollars a day, working on
clearing a five-kilometre stretch of the Kabul river as part of the
Recovery and Employment Afghanistan Programme (REAP), run by the United
Nations Development Programme, in collaboration with the Afghan
municipality. The once mighty river has been reduced to a polluted trickle
after four years of drought and decades of fighting. Rubble from the
conflict has been dumped into the river, which has also been used as a
public toilet and refuse site. "It smells and it is dirty. This is the
first time in 12 years that it is being cleaned," Mohammad said.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27140&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Focus on major repatriation accord

The office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on
Thursday welcomed a major refugee repatriation agreement signed between
Iran, Afghanistan and the refugee agency this week. The accord sets the
groundwork for hundreds of thousands of Afghans in Iran to go home this
year. "We hope to facilitate the voluntary repatriation of up to 400,000
Afghans," Mohammad Nouri, UNHCR spokesman in the Iranian capital, Tehran,
told IRIN. Internal factors inside Afghanistan could affect the actual
figures returning, he added. Nouri's comments follow the signing of the
Tripartite Agreement on Wednesday in the Swiss city of Geneva between the
Afghan interim authority's Repatriation Minister, Enayatollah Nazeri, the
Director of the Islamic Republic of Iran's Bureau for Aliens and Foreign
Immigration Affairs (BAFIA), Ahmad Husseini, and UN High Commissioner for
Refugees Ruud Lubbers.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27139&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Former military officers welcome "new" army

Former Afghan army officers now living as refugees in Pakistan have
welcomed the passing-out of the first intake of some 600 Afghan recruits
after they received six weeks of rigorous training by international
peacekeepers. "This is a good omen and a nice beginning," former general,
Shir Mohammad Karimi, told IRIN from the northwestern Pakistani city of
Peshawar on Thursday. Earlier in the week, Karimi's concerns were echoed
by the UN special envoy for Afghanistan, Lakhdar Brahimi, who appealed at
a donor meeting in Switzerland on the reform of Afghanistan's security
forces for about US $235 million this year for the country's army.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27119&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: UN optimistic after government moves on opium

The UN's drug control programme on Friday welcomed a decision by
Afghanistan's interim government to offer opium farmers US $250 per
destroyed field. With opium prices high and a bumper crop in the ground,
Afghanistan is set to become the biggest heroin producer in the world in
2002 unless the trade can be halted. "US $250 per 2,000 sq mt field is way
below what farmers will get from selling their opium crop, but it shows
commitment on the part of the government to tackling this huge problem,"
Glenn Mitterman of the United Nations Office for Drug Control and Crime
Prevention (UNDCP) told IRIN in Kabul. Hamid Karzai, chairman of
Afghanistan's interim government, warned in a decree issued this week that
forces from the interior ministry and provincial and local authorities
would "carry out enforcement" against those who continued to grow the crop
that was banned under the recently deposed Taliban regime.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27122&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: 39 feared dead in Faryab floods

Heavy flooding in the northern Afghan province of Faryab has claimed the
lives of at least 39 people, according to local authorities, a UN official
confirmed to IRIN in the Afghan capital Kabul on Friday. "We are trying to
send teams to the area to assess the situation but at the moment we are
not sure whether the road mission will be able to get there due to bad
weather and roads conditions," spokeswoman for the Office of the
Coordinator for Afghanistan, Stephanie Bunker said. The floods affected
some 843 families and 323 homes were reported to have been destroyed. More
than 2,000 livestock were killed and hundreds of acres of land, canals and
bridges were damaged in the Deh Miran area of Faryab. The UN, along with
the French NGO Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) and GOAL, an Irish NGO, were
preparing to take helicopters to the affected areas, which also include
Qal’a-I-Turdi and Ghulbian, north and east of Bilchiragh city in the
province. "The helicopter mission would also be reliant on good weather
conditions," Bunker maintained.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27123&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: WFP calls for more funds to sustain projects

The UN food agency (WFP) has warned that insufficient funding might force
it to stop or slow down many of its projects in Afghanistan. "There is a
lot of goodwill that should be translated into cash and food," agency
spokesman, Alejandro Chicheri told IRIN in Pakistan's capital Islamabad on
Friday. "The situation for the poor and most vulnerable will remain
difficult as they have met the ends of their coping mechanisms," he said.
Millions of Afghans had been displaced by the continuing drought in the
region - severely threatening the country's food production with a cereal
deficit of about 2.2 millions mt last year. WFP had appealed for some US
$285 million for a nine month programme to assist millions of Afghans till
the end of the year. However, the agency has so far received only $63.9
million. "We still have only 37 percent of the total resources required,"
Chicheri said. "We need at least 50 percent resources to assist some nine
million people each month before the harvest in July," he explained.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27124&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Musharraf's visit "a new chapter" in relations

Afghans welcomed Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf's one-day
visit to their capital, Kabul, on Tuesday with optimism and hope. "This is
the beginning of a new chapter of a beautiful relationship," Rahin
Makhdum, the interim Information and Culture Minister, told IRIN from
Kabul on Wednesday. Makhdum said he hoped the two countries would enjoy
good relations in the future. "We are two brotherly Muslim neighbours and
we should join hands in developing a common prosperous future," he said.
"Chairman [Hamid] Karzai and Musharraf mentioned many times that they want
to make a fresh start, leaving the legacies of the past behind." During
his first-ever visit to Afghanistan, Musharraf vowed to assist in its
reconstruction and to continue cooperating with it to wipe out terrorism
in the region. Pakistan and Afghanistan share over 2,000 km of common
border but there have been dramatic fluctuations in their relations in the
past due to border disputes, and more recently because of Pakistan's
support to the former hardline Taliban regime.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27094&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Turkey prepares to lead ISAF

A Turkish military delegation, led by Maj-Gen Akin Zorlu, arrived in the
Afghan capital, Kabul, on Thursday as a first step towards Turkey assuming
command of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) for
Afghanistan. Zorlu's visit comes less than a week after Turkey's National
Security Council accepted in principle that the country would lead the
4,800-strong international force. Reports indicate that Zorlu, heading the
42-member delegation, is regarded as the leading contender for the command
of the UN-sanctioned force, mandated to provide security in Kabul and the
surrounding areas as the interim Afghan authority establishes itself. He
and a group of Turkish officers are coordinating with the British team
currently leading the force to establish the requirements of the
operation.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27099&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Thousands of earthquake victims still in need

An extra 1,400 families living in remote areas surrounding Nahrin District
in northern Afghanistan, which was devastated by an earthquake last week,
have been found to be in urgent need of aid, a UN official told IRIN on
Thursday. The UN and other agencies had previously identified more than
20,000 families in the area in need of help. "A joint assessment of 7,000
families around Nahrin District was carried out by the government and aid
workers. They found an additional 1,400 families affected by the
earthquake," the spokeswoman for the office of the UN Coordinator for
Afghanistan, Stephanie Bunker, said in the Afghan capital, Kabul. The
government had alerted the aid community to the situation in the area. Of
the families identified, 900 had already received food aid and many had
been given tents, blankets and warm clothing, according to Bunker.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27098&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Popular culture begins returning to Kandahar

Still wearing the long tunics and black and white turbans of the Taliban
era, Kandaharis - the people of Kandahar - are returning en masse to
frequent music shops, play video games and fly kites. Such activities
would have been unthinkable six months ago when the much-feared police of
the now defunct Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of
Vice were still operating in this former Taliban stronghold. Muhammad
Rafi, like so many other Kandaharis, was a refugee in Pakistan for more
than 10 years. A music lover, he fled the civil war in Kandahar in 1992
and opened a CD and video shop in the southwestern Pakistani city of
Quetta.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27070&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Refugee repatriation tops 150,000

The office of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) on
Wednesday confirmed that the number of Afghans repatriated from Pakistan
since the joint repatriation programme began on 1 March has now topped
150,000. "It doesn't appear the numbers are going to dwindle any time
soon," UNHCR spokeswoman Melita Sunjic told IRIN in the Pakistani capital,
Islamabad. "Indeed, we could see a further increase," she said, adding
that thousands of Afghans were already waiting outside the Takhtabaig
voluntary repatriation centre (VRC) in Pakistan's North West Frontier
Province (NWFP) to register for the programme. But while Afghans are
showing unprecedented enthusiasm about returning, serious doubts are now
being raised about the availability of adequate funding. With people now
returning at a rate of 50,000 a week, UNHCR warned on Tuesday that there
was a danger that the rush could outstrip the funds available.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27074&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Former King to return on confidence-boosting trip

Middle-aged Muhammad Akram Maseed, an Afghan refugee shopkeeper in the
southern city of Dera Ismail Khan in Pakistan's North West Frontier
Province (NWFP), awaits the return later this month of Muhammad Zahir
Shah, Afghanistan's former monarch, with much optimism. "If he returns,
everything will be fine," he said. Maseed, like many of his generation, is
a die-hard royalist. "The past experiments have proved that only 'Ala
Hazrat' [Great Lord, the title given to Zahir Shah] can run our country,"
he maintained. Afghanistan's 87-year-old former King Muhammad Zahir Shah
is scheduled to return after nearly 29 years in exile. He would inaugurate
the "Emergency Loya Jirga" or grand council, in June. The Loya Jirga is
Afghanistan's next step towards democracy. To many Afghans like Maseed,
the former king represents a golden age of peace and democracy before the
country was ripped apart by conflict in the seventies.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27047&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Focus on female opium addiction

Rahema's tale is a sobering one. Three months pregnant, the 35-year-old
mother of six is Afghanistan's latest female victim of opium addiction.
Brought from remote northeastern Badakshan province to the Afghan
capital's only drug rehabilitation centre, she knows this is her last
chance for help. "I made a crucial decision to quit this addiction. My
future and that of my children depends on it," she told IRIN. But after so
many years of opium addiction, doctors wonder how much they can help - not
just Rahema, but other women like her.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27048&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Mixed reaction to grand council announcement

Afghan observers had mixed reactions to the announcement of the schedule
for a 1,500 member Loya Jirga (grand assembly) to be held in June this
year in the national capital Kabul. The assembly would choose
Afghanistan's new transitional government. "I am relatively optimistic,
devastation of the past has changed our attitudes and people have every
reason to pin hopes on any peaceful political developments," Ghulam Nabi
Chaknowri told IRIN from the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar
bordering Afghanistan on Monday. Chaknowri, a former Afghan
parliamentarian in his early eighties is one of the few living Afghans who
had attended three Loya Jirgas, the last being in 1964.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27039&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Tremors continuing as aid flows in

Despite continuing tremors in the earthquake area of Nahrin in the
northern Afghan province of Baghlan, further damage has been minimal, a UN
official in the Afghan capital, Kabul told IRIN on Monday. "There were
tremors over the weekend and the last one was on Saturday," spokeswoman
for the UN Office of the Coordinator for Afghanistan, Stephanie Bunker
said. Meanwhile, efforts to provide up to 23,000 families affected by the
quake with food aid were going well, a WFP official told IRIN on Monday.
"Within four days we have reached 60,000 people following the immediate
deployment of resources," WFP spokesman in Nahrin, Aljandro Lopez Chicheri
said. The death toll, following the quake on 25 March which hit 6.1 on the
Richter scale, is estimated at 800, according to the UN. However, other
reports suggest a much higher number running into thousands.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27036&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN


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