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

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Fax: +92-51-2211 450
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Central Asia
IRIN-CA Weekly Round-up 90
14 - 20 December 2002


CONTENTS:

AFGHANISTAN: Karzai acts to take the gun out of politics
PAKISTAN: Afghan camps improve after cold snap
PAKISTAN: Focus on Afghan repatriation numbers
TAJIKISTAN: EU increases aid
CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap

AFGHANISTAN: Karzai acts to take the gun out of politics

Afghans and international aid workers have cautiously welcomed President
Hamid Karzai’s executive order, issued on Monday, prohibiting political
leaders from participating in military pursuits. "It is a welcome
development, but its real test will be implementation on the ground," the
Afghan intellectual and commentator, Rostar Tarakai, told IRIN from the
French city of Lyon on Tuesday. "Other such declarations were not put into
action because they lacked the backing of an organised state force."

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=31412&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

PAKISTAN: Afghan camps improve after cold snap

The situation in the five displacement and asylum-seeker camps scattered
across the border close to the western Pakistani border town of Chaman and
the southeastern Afghan town of Spin Buldak across the border is improving
following the deaths of at least 12 children earlier this month during an
unexpectedly harsh cold spell. "The population is protected against the
recurrence of such weather," Jack Redden, the spokesman for the office of
the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), told IRIN in the Pakistani
capital, Islamabad, on Monday.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=31392&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN

PAKISTAN: Focus on Afghan repatriation numbers

Muhammad Ibrahim, a 20-year-old Afghan refugee, checks his luggage before
jumping aboard a colourful truck as he prepares to leave the Takhtabaig
voluntary repatriation centre (VRC) near Peshawar, capital of Pakistan's
North West Frontier Province (NWFP), for the eastern Afghan city of
Jalalabad. As the year draws to a close and winter sets in, returnee
numbers have tailed off. But some families are still deciding that there's
no time like the present to make the move from Pakistan.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=31425&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN

TAJIKISTAN: EU increases aid

Under a wide range of bilateral and multilateral regional projects for
humanitarian assistance, developmental aid and trade cooperation, the
European Union (EU) has stepped up its assistance to Tajikistan following
the second joint committee meeting in the Tajik capital, Dushanbe last
week. "This shows confidence in the adherence of the Tajik government to
reforms," Emin Sanginov, the director of the aid coordination unit of the
Tajik president's executive administration, told IRIN from Dushanbe on
Tuesday. "The EU is one of our major donors, and this is encouraging."

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=31447&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TAJIKISTAN

CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap

In Central Asia this week, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan traded accusations
as hundreds of people were arrested following an alleged assassination
attempt on Turkmen President Saparmurad Niyazov last month. Uzbek Foreign
Minister Abdulaziz Komilov on Thursday denied to the media that his
country had helped an alleged mastermind of the assassination bid. This
followed remarks on Wednesday by the Turkmen prosecutor-general,
Kurbanbibi Atazhanova, claiming that suspects held in connection with the
murder attempt had said [Boris] Shikhmuradov, a former Turkmen foreign
minister and one of four exiled opposition figures named by the Turkmen
authorities for organising the attack, had illegally crossed into
Turkmenistan from Uzbekistan the day before the president’s motorcade came
under fire on 25 November in the capital, Ashgabat.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=31454&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=CENTRAL_ASIA


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