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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e-mail: irin@irin.org.pk


Central Asia
IRIN-CA Weekly Round-up 117
21 - 27 June 2003


CONTENTS:

AFGHANISTAN: US military and government targeted in north
AFGHANISTAN: Drug abuse becoming a problem, says UN
AFGHANISTAN: National Solidarity Programme to boost rehabilitation
AFGHANISTAN: Information ministry works for release of journalists
AFGHANISTAN: Interview with Afghan vice-president
AFGHANISTAN-PAKISTAN: Minister raises concern over poppy cultivation
CENTRAL ASIA: Conference on Central Asian labour migration under way
CENTRAL ASIA: Focus on drug trafficking
CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap
PAKISTAN: Rehabilitation of former refugee settlement areas
PAKISTAN: First reported HIV-positive cases among intravenous drug users
TAJIKISTAN: Focus on constitutional referendum
TURKMENISTAN: High infant immunisation rates reported
TURKMENISTAN: Aid pipeline to Afghanistan scaling back
UZBEKISTAN: HIV/AIDS on the rise, experts say
UZBEKISTAN: Afghan refugees face uncertain future


AFGHANISTAN: US military and government targeted in north

Aid workers have reiterated concerns over the progress of reconstruction
following a recent attack on the government and the US military in
northern Afghanistan. Although it is still unclear as to who was behind
the attack, such action by dissidents against the international military
forces and both central and regional governments have been frequent. In
this incident, which took place in Konduz Province on Saturday, there were
three explosions, the first at the residence of the provincial governor
and the other two near a building housing coalition forces, an unnamed
coalition officer in the capital, Kabul, confirmed to IRIN.


AFGHANISTAN: Drug abuse becoming a problem, says UN

The International Day Against Drugs and Illicit Trafficking was marked in
the capital, Kabul, on Thursday with a warning from the United Nations.
"Unfortunately, drug abuse is becoming a problem in different areas of
Afghanistan," David Macdonald, a senior adviser in the UN Office on Drugs
and Crime (UNODC), told IRIN on Thursday. "We need to have drug abuse
prevention campaigns in all over Afghanistan to help vulnerable groups to
turn away from drug abuse and solve their problems," he added.


AFGHANISTAN: National Solidarity Programme to boost rehabilitation

The government has announced that intensive rehabilitation projects will
be undertaken in 5,000 villages country-wide within the next four weeks
under the National Solidarity Programme (NSP). The announcement follows
the inauguration of the fifth launch of the NSP in the central Bamian
Province last week. "The NSP has already been launched in five provinces,
including Farah, Herat, Kandahar, Parvan and Bamian, and will be
undertaken in all other provinces in the next four weeks," Rural
Rehabilitation and Development Minister Mohammad Hanif Atmar told IRIN in
Bamian.


AFGHANISTAN: Information ministry works for release of journalists

A senior official says his ministry is working to bring about the
immediate release of a local newspaper editor and a journalist, after
their arrest on charges of blasphemy. "I have talked regarding the release
of the two detainees and I was told that they were in custody for their
own protection. But we still emphasise that they must be released very
soon," Minister of Information and Culture Sayed Makhdom Rahin told IRIN
in the Afghan capital, Kabul on Monday.


AFGHANISTAN: Interview with Afghan vice-president

Vice-President Hedayat Amin Arsala is considered to be one of the leading
moderates among the members of Afghan President Hamid Karzai's cabinet.
Educated in the West, Arsala worked for the World Bank for many years,
overseeing that organisation's activities in many South Asian and South
East Asian nations. He participated in the anti-Soviet resistance in 1980s
and was one of the leading members of the Rome peace group under the
former Afghan monarch, Muhammad Zahir Shah. A finance minister and deputy
chairman of the interim Afghan government after the fall of the Taliban in
late 2001, he is one of the four vice-presidents and considered a key
member of the transitional administration.


AFGHANISTAN-PAKISTAN: Minister raises concern over poppy cultivation

A Pakistani minister has reiterated Islamabad's concern over the
resurgence of poppy cultivation in neighbouring Afghanistan. "The whole US
army is there, but now they are saying that production is increasing. If
they cannot stop it with all the satellites and the latest equipment that
they have in such a huge force, who can?" Health Minister Muhammad Nasir
Khan told IRIN in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad.


CENTRAL ASIA: Conference on Central Asian labour migration under way

Government representatives and senior officials from the four Central
Asian states of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan - and
the Russian Federation - have gathered in the eastern Kyrgyz resort area
of Ysyk-Kol this week in an effort to improve cooperation on dealing with
the increasing flow of migrant workers in the region. "The issue of
unregulated labour migration is a major issue in Central Asia," the acting
chief of mission for the International Organisation for Migration (IOM),
Frederic Chenais, told IRIN from the Kyrgyz capital, Bishkek, on Tuesday,
emphasising the need for stronger regularisation and legislation to
protect not just the migrant but also the sending and receiving countries.


CENTRAL ASIA: Focus on drug trafficking

Drug trafficking continues to grow in Central Asia. Home to some 60
million people, the five-nation region, comprising Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan,
Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, is also the site of a major
international drug-trafficking route. "The amount of drugs is continuously
increasing," the regional representative for the United Nations Office on
Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Antonella Deledda Titchener, told IRIN from the
Uzbek capital, Tashkent, noting that over the last three years, the number
of seizures had increased by 90 percent, while decreasing in neighbouring
Pakistan and Iran.


CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap

The week started with a constitutional referendum in Tajikistan on Sunday,
the result of which provided incumbent President Emomali Rahmonov with the
opportunity to extend his term of office beyond 2006. Tajik presidents can
henceforth serve for two seven-year terms instead of one, a decision which
has raised concerns on the part of international observers. On Tuesday,
the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) advised
caution, noting the very high voter turnout for the referendum - up to 96
percent - raised doubts over the vote's accuracy.


PAKISTAN: Rehabilitation of former refugee settlement areas

As the repatriation drive of Afghan refugees continues, the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) and the Pakistani government have agreed to
rehabilitate areas being vacated by the refugees. "Once the refugees have
left the area, the structures need to be rehabilitated, because they are
an environmental hazard," Abdul Akbar, the public relations officer for
Pakistan's Federal Minister for Water and Power, Kashmir Affairs, States
and Frontier Regions, told IRIN in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, on
Wednesday.


PAKISTAN: First reported HIV-positive cases among intravenous drug users

Pakistan's National Aids Control Programme (NACP) has confirmed nine new
cases of HIV among drug users in the southern Sindh Province, the first to
be detected among intravenous drug users in the country. "It is shocking,
because this is the first time we have found HIV-positive people among
drug users, and this is worrying," Sharaf Ali Shah, the head of the NACP
in Sindh, told IRIN from the provincial capital, Karachi, on Thursday.
According to Shah, the cases were discovered following the testing of a
prisoner who was using heroin in jail in Larkana, some 300 km north of
Karachi. The police reacted to this one case by rounding up some 60 drug
addicts and carrying out HIV tests on them over the past week.


TAJIKISTAN: Focus on constitutional referendum

With a 93 percent yes vote, the electorate in Tajikistan last Sunday
approved a package of constitutional amendments that may have far reaching
conseqences including the incumbent president, Emomali Rahmonov, ruling
the country for another 17 years, and power being further concentrated in
the presidency. The referendum was initiated by the Tajik parliament and,
after the approval vote, changes can be made to the preamble and 54
articles of the constitution, which was adopted in 1994 and amended in
1999. The official explanation for the exercise was that, after a decade,
provisions in the supreme law needed modifying to bring it up to
contemporary standards.


TURKMENISTAN: High infant immunisation rates reported

It's late in the afternoon and six-month-old Maya wails after receiving an
injection that will protect her from mumps, tetanus and polio,
administered at a small clinic outside the Turkmen capital, Ashgabat. As
the screaming dies down and her mother bundles her out, another baby is
laid on the vaccination table. The nurse administering the vaccine has
been at it for six hours nonstop "Almost 50 done today," she announces as
she prepares another syringe.


TURKMENISTAN: Aid pipeline to Afghanistan scaling back

Although 80,000 mt of food sponsored by World Food Programme (WFP) has
been transited via Turkmenistan into northern Afghanistan and Tajikistan
in the past 12 months, the amount is diminishing as emergency food needs
in the region change, IRIN learnt on Thursday. "Over the past year,
approximately 78,000 mt of WFP food crossed Turkmenabad in Turkmenistan
bordering northwestern Afghanistan, with a monthly average of 6,500 mt,"
Sewoo Kim, a WFP reports officer in the Afghan capital, Kabul, told IRIN.


UZBEKISTAN: HIV/AIDS on the rise, experts say

HIV/AIDS is on the rise in Uzbekistan, say experts. Despite a currently
low HIV/AIDS prevalence, health officials believe that the country
occupies one of the leading positions in the world in terms of the rate of
the disease's spread. "The situation with HIV/AIDS in the country is
getting more complex, with the number of HIV/AIDS cases increasing,"
Muntaz Khakimov, the director at the national HIV/AIDS centre, told IRIN
from the Uzbek capital, Tashkent. According to Khakimov, there were some
2,000 officially registered HIV/AIDS incidences as of April 2003, compared
to over 1,000 cases in 2002, thereby highlighting the growth dynamics of
the disease. Since the first case was registered in 1991, there had been
some 61 HIV/AIDS-related deaths, he noted.


UZBEKISTAN: Afghan refugees face uncertain future

Despite intense media attention on the number of Afghan living in Pakistan
and Iran - the two countries hosting the largest number of Afghan refugees
today - little is known about those living in Uzbekistan, Central Asia's
most populous state. While few in number, they too face an uncertain
future in their quest to return home. "Their life is certainly not the
best," Abdul Karim Gul, chief of mission for the Office of the High
Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), told IRIN from the Uzbek capital,
Tashkent. "They have very limited status here. Aside from some very
limited material and social assistance provided by UNHCR, including
medical assistance, they have no benefits here."


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