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Central Asia
IRIN-CA Weekly Round-up 74
24 - 30 August 2002


CONTENTS:

IRAN: Flash floods set to continue
IRAN: Afghan refugees feel under pressure to leave
IRAN: Interview with head of immigration and refugee affairs
AFGHANISTAN: Floods kill 9 people in Khowst
AFGHANISTAN: Small bomb explodes close to UN facility
AFGHANISTAN: Bright future for Mazar as grid power returns
PAKISTAN: Focus on peasant protest
PAKISTAN: Focus on gender training for TV scriptwriters
PAKISTAN: Interview with new Afghan ambassador
PAKISTAN: Agreement reached on release of Pakistani prisoners
PAKISTAN: Heavy rains destroy capital slum dwellings
TAJIKISTAN: Reconstruction of vital aid route welcomed
TAJIKISTAN: European Union resumes technical assistance
TAJIKISTAN: Independent radio licence granted
KAZAKHSTAN: Chechen refugees want their status resolved
CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap


IRAN: Flash floods set to continue

The United Nations in Tehran has warned that floods will continue to play
havoc in the country unless effective preparedness and preventive
measures are undertaken soon. "Floods are increasing," Hossein Jafari, a
UN Development Programme (UNDP) officer, told IRIN in the Iranian
capital, Tehran. "They are now the number-one natural disaster in Iran
today." His comments come just two weeks after a devastating flash flood
ripped through the northeastern provinces of Golestan, Khorasan and
Semnan, leaving 51 people dead and hundreds homeless. Most of the victims
were travelling on a bus from the northern city of Babol to the
northeastern city of Mashhad.


IRAN: Afghan refugees feel under pressure to leave

Under Tuesday's government-imposed deadline for undocumented Afghans
living in Iran to report to the Office of the Bureau for Foreign
Immigrants and Alien Affairs (BAFIA) for exit documents, an increasing
number of refugees report feeling pressured to go home. "I heard that all
Afghans should leave Iran. That's why I'm leaving," Aref Teymuri told IRIN
at the Soleyman Khani voluntary repatriation centre (VRC) in the Iranian
capital, Tehran. "I would rather stay. At least here I can work," the
20-year-old day labourer said, minutes before boarding a bus for
Afghanistan.


IRAN: Interview with head of immigration and refugee affairs

The fact that today Iran is host to the greatest number of refugees in the
world remains an untold story. Despite this distinction, the government
maintains that little international assistance or recognition has been
forthcoming, thereby compelling the authorities to shoulder most of the
burden unaided. In an exclusive interview with IRIN on Thursday, Ahmad
Hosseini, the director-general of the interior ministry^Òs Bureau of
Aliens and Foreign Immigrants Affairs Office (BAFIA), the coordinating
body for refugee affairs, discussed the refugee issues facing his country.


AFGHANISTAN: Floods kill 9 people in Khowst

At least nine people were dead and another 26 missing after heavy rains
caused flash floods in Afghanistan's southeastern province of Khowst, the
governor told IRIN on Wednesday. "First it was drought and now the rains
have ruined us," Governor of Khowst, Hakim Taniwal said. Most of the dead
and missing had gone to collect valuable logs caught in torrents of water
when they themselves were washed away. Much livestock was lost and
agricultural land damaged, he added. The power struggle between the two
and US-led coalition force's mopping up operations against Al-Qaeda and
the Taliban makes the province one of the most insecure in the country.


AFGHANISTAN: Small bomb explodes close to UN facility

A bomb explosion outside the main UN guesthouse in the Afghan capital
Kabul on Sunday evening left a girl slightly injured. UN spokesman in
Kabul Manoel de Almeida e Silva told IRIN from Kabul that as the blast
happened outside the UN facility on a busy road, it was difficult to draw
any conclusions about the attack or the motive behind it. "We don't know
the intentions or who the perpetrators were," he said. The small home-made
device appeared to have been placed in a rubbish bin outside the perimeter
of the building that serves as accommodation for UN staff operating in
Kabul.


AFGHANISTAN: Bright future for Mazar as grid power returns

Northern Afghanistan's largest city, Mazar-e Sharif, will be reconnected
to neighbouring Uzbekistan's electricity network on Friday launching a new
era in the city's post-Taliban development. The electricity supply to
Mazar-e Sharif and other towns and cities in northern Afghanistan was
disconnected four years ago because Afghanistan's hard-line Taliban regime
did not pay Tashkent for the power. The provinces of Samangan and Faryab
along with the towns of Sheberghan, Andkhvoy and Kholm will receive
electricity from the former Soviet republic of Uzbekistan. "Electricity
will boost the cottage industry in the city," Najeeb Kamdar, a UN employee
in Mazar-e Sharif told IRIN. He adding that the local media and radio
depended on power to publish and broadcast and that reliable power would
be a great boost for the city.


PAKISTAN: Focus on peasant protest

Thousands of Pakistani peasants in Punjab Province have locked horns with
the military authorities over a land dispute which has caused the deaths
of at least five people and injured a dozen more over the last two months,
farmers and officials told IRIN. The dispute, smouldering for close to a
year in some of the military controlled agricultural farms of the province
- the country's bread-basket - has now escalated into an open
confrontation between the tenant farmers and government authorities. The
farmers' representatives say in Pakistan, whether tenants or owners, the
community is already under stress for a number of reasons and forms the
bulk of growing number of poor people in the country.


PAKISTAN: Focus on gender training for TV scriptwriters

Despite 30 years of experience in writing television and radio drama
scripts in Pakistan, it was only after attending a gender training
workshop that Musarat Clanchvi felt she could break away from
stereotypical story lines portraying women in a negative light. "I was
never as bold in my writing," she told IRIN from Lahore in Punjab
Province. With more than 200 television and radio scripts for plays and
dramas under her belt, Clanchvi thought the workshops run under the
Portrayal of Women in the Media project had given her writing a new lease
of life.


PAKISTAN: Interview with new Afghan ambassador

Rehmatullah Musa Ghazi has a delicate balancing act to perform as
Afghanistan's first postwar ambassador to neighbouring Pakistan. Although
the two countries have much in common - religion, culture and languages,
relations have been strained for many years due to Pakistan's links with
the ousted Taliban movement. In an interview with IRIN, Ghazi, who was
also ambassador to Pakistan in the mid 1990s during the government of
President Burhanuddin Rabbani, said Afghanistan's development and
prosperity was very closely tied in with Pakistan.


PAKISTAN: Agreement reached on release of Pakistani prisoners

Human rights activists and independent analysts have welcomed the
announcement of the release of hundreds of pro-Taliban Pakistani prisoners
of war from neighbouring Afghanistan. "In principle, there has been a
decision by Afghanistan about the release of Pakistani prisoners of war,"
Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah told reporters in the Pakistani
capital, Islamabad, on Tuesday. "The first batch will be released soon,"
he added. Afghan diplomatic sources told IRIN that no agreement on the
numbers of prisoners to be released had yet been reached.


PAKISTAN: Heavy rains destroy capital slum dwellings

Heavy rains in the Pakistani capital Islamabad have destroyed hundreds of
mud houses in slum areas, forcing people to move in with neighbours until
the monsoon season ends when they can start rebuilding. "Our kitchen and
bathroom have been washed away into the ditch next to our house," Arshad,
owner of a mud house in the F6/2 sector of Islamabad, told IRIN. It was
only last month that he had rebuilt his house, which consisted of one
room, a makeshift bathroom and kitchen, following a storm.


TAJIKISTAN: Reconstruction of vital aid route welcomed

Aid workers in Tajikistan have welcomed a Saudi-funded project to
reconstruct a stretch of road damaged by landslides and mudslides over the
years. The road is a vital link between the remote eastern Badakhshon
Province and central areas and is critical for food aid deliveries to
Afghanistan from Central Asia. "The road is the main access route to
Badakhshon and northeastern Afghanistan, so the quick implementation of
the project is welcomed by the aid community," Valentin Gatzinski, the
head of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the
Tajik capital, Dushanbe, told IRIN. The government of Saudi Arabia is
providing a loan of about US $6 million for the project.


TAJIKISTAN: European Union resumes technical assistance

The European Commission (EC) has resumed its assistance project known as
TACIS (Technical Assistance to CIS) to Tajikistan following a four year
suspension, an EC official confirmed to IRIN on Friday. "This time there
will be a regional strategy for all of the Central Asian Republics," team
leader of the Tacis project in the Tajik capital, Dushanbe, Pierre-pul
Antheunissens said. The programme was suspended in 1998 after two French
programme experts were taken hostage by a terrorist group - one died
during the rescue operation. The programme has been resumed in the light
of events in the region post 11 September, Antheunissens said.


TAJIKISTAN: Independent radio licence granted

The Tajik government has reversed a decision denying an independant news
agency a radio licence, following pressure from media groups and the
international community. "Issuing the new broadcasting licenses is an
important step for Tajik society," director of the Asia-Plus news agency,
Umed Babakhanov, told IRIN from the Tajik capital, Dushanbe on Wednesday.
Babakhanov met the Tajik President, Emomali Rahmonov late last month to
discuss the failure of the Tajik government's Television and Radio
Committee to grant Asia-Plus a licence for an independent radio station.
The President called on the Committee to issue the licence without further
delay following the meeting, he said.


KAZAKHSTAN: Chechen refugees want their status resolved

Holding up her blistered hands, Aniese, a 43-year old Chechen widow, told
IRIN that despite earlier being a well-paid laboratory technician, she is
now forced to pick potatoes in market gardens outside Kazakhstan's
commercial capital, Almaty. Waiting patiently in line for a twice-monthly
food handout from a Kuwaiti charity, she knows it means the difference
between feeding her four children and letting them go hungry. According to
the Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), there are over
12,000 Chechen refugees in Kazakhstan. The government says there are many
more, including rebel soldiers.


CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly News Wrap

A US-supported anti-narcotics operation spanning Russia and four Central
Asian nations, and involving coordination of 25,000 law enforcement
officers, netted more than 4,700 mt of drugs in two days, local and
international media reported. The sweep, which started on 10 July,
resulted in the arrest of hundreds of suspects. Last week the US
government announced a grant of US $9.0 million to Tajikistan to fight
drug-trafficking. It also provided 15 Russian-made military vehicles to
help patrol Kazakhstan's borders and promised 14 more in the next two
weeks. In Tajikistan, an international forum on environment and water
resource management, said this week that the dying Aral Sea required at
least five cubic km of water each year it it was to recover from decades
of draining for agricultural purposes.



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