Weekly Round-Up - IRINCAS-76: 13-Sep-02
U N I T E D N A T I O N S
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Central Asia
IRIN-CA Weekly Round-up 76
07 - 13 September 2002
CONTENTS:
AFGHANISTAN: Fewer refugees returning
AFGHANISTAN: Humanitarian work resumes in Khowst after fighting
AFGHANISTAN: One year on, security remains major concern
AFGHANISTAN: Interview with foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah
AFGHANISTAN: Seed bank destruction may cause agriculture loss
PAKISTAN: Anti-polio drive set to resume in frontier province
PAKISTAN: Islamabad braces itself ahead of 9/11
PAKISTAN: Al-Qaeda suspects in Karachi shoot-out
PAKISTAN: Interview with presidential spokesman
UZBEKISTAN: HRW condemns death of prisoners
UZBEKISTAN: Bumper wheat crop
TAJIKISTAN: ADB announces loan to avert disaster
KYRGYZSTAN: Focus on scholarship testing
AFGHANISTAN: Fewer refugees returning
The number of Afghan refugees returning home is slowing down as cooler
night temperatures discourage families from leaving camps in neighbouring
Pakistan and Iran, a spokesman for the United Nations High Commissioner
for Refugees (UNHCR) told IRIN on Thursday. "We are at levels very similar
to the start of operations in March," spokesman Jack Redden told IRIN in
the Pakistani capital, Islamabad. According to the latest UNHCR figures,
1.66 million Afghan refugees have returned from Iran, Pakistan and the
Central Asian states since the end of last winter. These have been helped
by UNHCR and an additional 400,000 have gone back on their own.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29847&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN: Humanitarian work resumes in Khowst after fighting
Some humanitarian work has resumed in the southeastern Afghan town of
Khowst, after four days of fighting that left at least five people dead
and another 10 wounded, tribal leaders, aid workers and officials told
IRIN on Wednesday. Paul Barker country director of international NGO Care,
told IRIN from the Afghan capital, Kabul that their teacher training
programme in the provincial capital of Khowst had resumed after remaining
closed for one day. "This reflects the confidence of the neighbouring
villagers that calm has returned," he said.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29824&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN: One year on, security remains major concern
On the anniversary of the September 11 attacks, humanitarian workers, both
local and international, in Afghanistan's capital Kabul, expressed
increasing concern over security in the city and the rest of country after
a wave of violent attacks and renewed fighting in the east left dozens of
people dead. Kabul was the scene last Thursday of a major car bomb attack
which killed 26 people and wounded many more. The same day, President
Hamid Karzai survived an assassination attempt in the southern city of
Kandahar. "I think these recent incidents are a reminder that we are still
working in a very insecure environment," Nigel Fisher, the UN special
representative for relief and reconstruction, told IRIN. "They were a
wake-up call, and we should take as many security measures as we can," he
said.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29818&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN: Interview with foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah
A year ago the changes that have taken place in Afghanistan would have
been unthinkable. In a special interview with IRIN to commemorate the 11
September attacks, Afghanistan's Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah said
his country needed to build on the achievements of the past 12 months,
maintain international interest in reconstruction and take its historic
place once again at the crossroads of Europe and Asia.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29793&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN: Seed bank destruction may cause agriculture loss
Scientist have termed the destruction of Afghanistan's largest seed
collection or gene bank a tragic loss to the country's food production
capabilities already struggling with the effects of years of conflict and
the worst drought in 40 years. "This is a substantial damage because,
unfortunately, nobody has maintained a comprehensive seed bank of
Afghanistan's diverse seed varieties," N.S. Tunwar, a senior technical
adviser with the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), told IRIN
from the Afghan capital, Kabul on Thursday.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29844&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
PAKISTAN: Anti-polio drive set to resume in frontier province
A campaign to immunise some 150,000 children against polio in Pakistan's
North West Frontier Province (NWFP) will resume on Tuesday, after being
postponed for a week due to tribal tensions, a Pakistani health official
confirmed to IRIN on Monday. "The situation is fluid but we hope to
continue with our work tomorrow," programme manager for Pakistan's
expanded programme on immunisation in the NWFP, Dr Hameed Afridi said. The
immunisation days for the Khyber Agency, originally planned for 3,4,5
September, did not take place due to a dispute, which involved local
authorities and villagers protesting electricity tariffs. Local people
were not allowing government vehicles in parts of the Khyber Agency.
Hameed explained that the polio teams did not want to take risks and
therefore decided to postpone the immunisation programme. "We thought we
should wait and see," he added.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29774&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
PAKISTAN: Islamabad braces itself ahead of 9/11
Pakistan, a key member of the US-led coalition against terrorism, will be
on high alert on 11 September, even though no specific threats are known
to the authorities, a senior government official told IRIN on Tuesday. "We
have put our security structures on the ground," Brig Iqbal Cheema, head
of the national crisis centre set up after 11 September, told IRIN in the
Pakistani capital, Islamabad. On the eve of the first anniversary of the
attacks on New York and Washington, the Pakistani authorities have beefed
up security in all areas considered to be vulnerable, including foreign
missions, government buildings, places of worship and markets.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29796&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
PAKISTAN: Al-Qaeda suspects in Karachi shoot-out
As the world remembered the dead from last year's attacks on New York and
Washington at least two suspected Al-Qaeda gunmen were killed and five
arrested by the Pakistani police after more than three hours of gunfire in
an upper-class residential district of Karachi on Wednesday, government
officials said. A young girl was also killed in the shoot-out. "Two gunmen
have been killed and five have been arrested," a senior security official
told IRIN in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad. He said a young girl also
became the victim of the cross fire. Those arrested could not speak Urdu -
the language of Pakistan - fuelling speculation that they may be of Arabic
origin.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29826&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
PAKISTAN: Interview with presidential spokesman
Maj-Gen Rashid Qureshi, the spokesman for Pakistani President Pervez
Musharraf, is highly optimistic despite increased violence on the part of
Islamic militants enraged by the government's pro-Western stance. In
extracts from an interview with IRIN, he dismissed the threat posed by
militancy, and in the run-up to October's parliamentary elections
portrayed Musharraf as the most democratic and reformist leader ever in
the chequered political history of Pakistan.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29820&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
UZBEKISTAN: HRW condemns death of prisoners
London-based NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW) has condemned the suspicious
deaths of two Uzbek prisoners, saying that there has still not been any
response from the government regarding the horrific circumstances under
which they died. "We have repeatedly been in touch with the Uzbek
authorities but with little effect," London director for HRW, Steve
Crawshaw, told IRIN on Tuesday from the capital city. Human rights
activist Muzaffar Avazov and Khuzniddin Alimov were reportedly jailed for
refusing to worship at state-sanctioned mosques. According to human rights
groups they died after being subjected to torture at the Jaslyk camp near
the Aral sea region of western Uzbekistan and died 8 August.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29798&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=UZBEKISTAN
UZBEKISTAN: Bumper wheat crop
Uzbekistan is likely to harvest an unprecedented 5.3 million mt of cereals
in 2002, which is some 1.4 million mt higher than last year's harvest, a
United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) official said on
Wednesday. "Improved precipitation, water availability and relatively
improved access to inputs are the main factors contributing to this year's
bumper crop," Aziz Arya, an economist at Commodities and Trade Division of
FAO, told IRIN from Rome. Uzbekistan, like its other Central Asian
neighbours, had been in the grip of a drought for three years, forcing the
government to rely on substantial imports of basic foods. Arya said this
year's harvest would include about 4.9 million mt of wheat, as against 3.4
million mt last year.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29840&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=UZBEKISTAN
TAJIKISTAN: ADB announces loan to avert disaster
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has earmarked a loan of US $5.3 million
to help avert a disaster following a landslide in the south of Tajikistan,
a move hailed by aid workers in the impoverished Central Asian country.
"The amount of work involved and the cost is not something emergency aid
agencies can take on unfortunately," humanitarian officer for the Office
for the Coordinator of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Andrea Reccia, told
IRIN on Thursday from the Tajik capital, Dushanbe.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29845&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TAJIKISTAN
KYRGYZSTAN: Focus on scholarship testing
"We are trying to create a new citizen," says the charismatic but
soft-spoken former Kyrgyz education minister, "to arm the people with
something new, to make them flexible and able to respond to the market."
Camilla Sharshekeeva, the former cabinet minister, now provost of the
American University in Kyrgyzstan (AUK), believes that the country's
future is in the hands of the educators responsible for training
Kyrgyzstan's future leaders. Scholarships at prestigious Kyrgyz
universities have traditionally been for sale. For example, it is said to
cost US $2,500 to enter the country's Medical Academy. Rectors have
traditionally been the main beneficiaries of these payments, to supplement
their official monthly salaries of between $60 and $80.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29839&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=KYRGYZSTAN
CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap
Russia, Iran, and Kazakhstan intend to restore monitoring of the
biological balance of the Caspian Sea, Alexander Bedritsky, Chief of
Russia's Roshydromet Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Monitoring
of the Environment, said this week. Bedritsky, while summing up the
results of the 7th session of the five Caspian countries' coordinating
committee on hydrometeorology and sea pollution monitoring (CASPCOM) said
the government of Turkmenistan had already taken a decision on the matter,
which is also to be considered by Azerbaijan. Bedritsky believes that "an
agreement to this effect will be signed " at CASPCOM's next session next
year.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=29870&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=CENTRAL_ASIA
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