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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Central Asia
IRIN-CA Weekly Round-up 118
28 June - 4 July 2003


CONTENTS:

AFGHANISTAN: New report on post-conflict children
AFGHANISTAN: Bomb explosion kills two in Kabul
AFGHANISTAN: Amnesty expresses concern over UK's "forcible return" approach
AFGHANISTAN: ARCS faces serious funding shortage
CENTRAL ASIA: OSCE Chairman-in-Office to begin regional tour
CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap
KAZAKHSTAN: Rights abuses fuelling HIV infection rates
KAZAKHSTAN: Radioactive levels in Semipalatinsk remain problematic
KYRGYZSTAN: Human trafficking on the rise
KYRGYZSTAN: Flood and emergency preparedness in the south
PAKISTAN: Interview with head of EC delegation
PAKISTAN: Bar council calls for judicial reform
PAKISTAN: 184 Afghan families leave Chaman waiting area
PAKISTAN: First National Human Development Report launched
PAKISTAN: Water shortage causes skin ailments in Karachi
TAJIKISTAN: Water conference calls for regional cooperation
TAJIKISTAN: WFP closes Pamir aid corridor to Afghanistan
TURKMENISTAN: Testing the Amudar'ya river to improve water quality
TURKMENISTAN: Rights groups slam government over dual nationality

AFGHANISTAN: New report on post-conflict children

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and Save the Children US on
Tuesday issued a report on the impact of conflict on Afghan children. The
report, entitled "The children of Kabul", indicates that despite many
threats to children's wellbeing in postwar Afghanistan, families have
developed ways of coping with daily challenges and discovered strengths
and resources to limit the impact of the war on their children. "The
children of Afghanistan are much stronger than perhaps many people would
believe, and families have clearly found ways of coping with the impact of
the war in order to protect their children," the report's principal
author, Jo de Berry of Save the Children, said on Tuesday in the capital,
Kabul, at the launch of the report.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35110&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN]

AFGHANISTAN: Bomb explosion kills two in Kabul

The Afghan government announced that two men were killed when a bomb
prematurely exploded on Tuesday at 21:00 local time in the Pol-e Charkhi,
three kilometres from the Afghan National Army training centre and German
peacekeeping base in the east of the capital, Kabul. "One person was
smashed to pieces and was beyond recognition and the other was recognised
as a resident of the same locality," Afghan Interior Minister Ali Ahmad
Jalali told IRIN in Kabul on Thursday.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35166&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN]

AFGHANISTAN: Amnesty expresses concern over UK's "forcible return"
approach

Sitting in a relative's dark, tiny room with no electricity and telephone
in the capital, Kabul, Nik Mohammad, a newly deported Afghan from Britain,
told IRIN he could not decide whether to go home to the troubled southern
city of Ghazni, as there were clear security threats. "I heard there were
two terrorist incidents and rocket attacks in Ghazni only this week and
there is no work at all," said the 28-year-old Afghan, who had gone to
Britain during the Taliban period in 2000, and was deported together with
43 other Afghans on Thursday.

[For a full copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35182&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN]

AFGHANISTAN: ARCS faces serious funding shortage

The Afghan Red Crescent Society (ARCS) has warned President Hamid Karzai
that it faces a severe funding crisis threatening its essential
health-care operation. It told Karzai on Thursday that its network of 50
clinics, which provide services to some 2 million people, and remained
operational under the Taliban, may be forced to make major cutbacks. "We
made the point that the Afghan Red Crescent is not getting adequate
recognition for its work," Bob McKerrow, the head of the International
Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies in South Asia, said
after meeting Karzai.

[For a full copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35207&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN]

CENTRAL ASIA: OSCE Chairman-in-Office to begin regional tour

The Chairman-in-Office of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in
Europe (OSCE), Netherlands Foreign Minister Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, is set
to travel to Central Asia this weekend, taking in four of the five OSCE
participating states in the region. "The important thing really is to keep
up the dialogue with the Central Asian countries," spokeswoman for the
Chairman-in-Office, Stella Ronner told IRIN from the Hague. "This is all
the more true since the presence of other international organizations
there is relatively modest."

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35169&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=CENTRAL_ASIA]

CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap

This week in Central Asia, journalists in Kazakhstan marked their
professional day on Saturday. According to the Kazakhstan Today news
agency, there were some 2,000 publications in the country, of which almost
80 percent were independent. The agency stated that while there was no
official censorship in the country, journalists did practise
self-censorship, thereby avoiding such "dangerous" topics as "big"
politics, corruption and criticism of local authorities. In neighbouring
Kyrgyzstan, Amarkul Aitaliev, a senior official at the Kyrgyz Ecology and
Emergency Situations Ministry, appealed on Monday for urgent help to avert
the danger posed by a Soviet-era uranium mine threatening the densely
populated Ferghana Valley.

[For a full copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35208&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=CENTRAL_ASIA]

KAZAKHSTAN: Rights abuses fuelling HIV infection rates

Human rights abuse of injecting drug users and commercial sex workers in
Kazakhstan continues to fuel one of the most rapidly growing AIDS
epidemics in the world, Human Rights Watch (HRW) declared on Monday. "We
are talking about an AIDS epidemic that is one of the fastest growing in
the world," Marie Struthers, a researcher for the HIV/AIDS programme for
the group, told IRIN from Moscow, noting that in 2001, Kazakh statistics
had indicated an infection rate rising by 240 percent.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35079&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=KAZAKHSTAN]

KAZAKHSTAN: Radioactive levels in Semipalatinsk remain problematic

Levels of radioactivity in northeastern Kazakhstan's former Semipalatinsk
nuclear testing area remain a source of concern, IRIN learnt on Tuesday.
One of three sites across the former Soviet Union where hundreds of
nuclear tests occurred until 1990, its legacy continues to this day. "The
radioactive situation has worsened," Larisa Ptitskaya, the director for
the institute for radioactive security and ecology at the National Nuclear
Centre of Kazakhstan, told IRIN from Kurchatov town, 130 km from
Semipalatinsk. Attributing the downturn to both human and climatic
factors, she noted that the radioactivity was moving as a result of dust
flows and steppe fires in the region.

[For a full copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35108&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=KAZAKHSTAN]

KYRGYZSTAN: Human trafficking on the rise

Officials of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) have
expressed concern over human trafficking in Kyrgyzstan, which is said to
be on the rise due to poverty, high unemployment and inadequate legal
regulation. "The risk of being trafficked remains high and there have been
numerous victims applying for assistance," Damira Smanalieva, the IOM
project director in the capital, Bishkek, told IRIN on Wednesday. She said
there could be countless other victims who are scared of the
law-enforcement authorities or afraid to come forward for other reasons.

[For a full copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35130&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=KYRGYZSTAN]

KYRGYZSTAN: Flood and emergency preparedness in the south

Authorities in southern Kyrgyzstan have urged the government to declare
the south an emergency area and develop a programme to move people from
disaster-exposed mountainous villages to more secure places. There have
been more than 50 natural disasters in the region this year alone -floods,
mud-slides and earthquakes. In April, a landslide triggered by heavy rains
and melting snow slammed into Karataryk, a village of between 200 and 300
people in Uzgen District about 100 km east of Osh, and killed 38 people.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35067&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=KYRGYZSTAN]

PAKISTAN: Interview with head of EC delegation

As Pakistan's principal trading partner, the EU says that, as a result of
bad publicity and security lapses, persuading investors to put money into
the country has become an uphill struggle. However, the EU has implemented
measures to help Pakistan's weak economy by instituting a quota increase
of 15 percent for textiles and clothing products and duty free imports of
clothing products under the Generalised Scheme of Tariff Preferences for
the period 2002-2004 [tariff arrangements for developing countries].

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35109&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN]

PAKISTAN: Bar council calls for judicial reform

The Pakistan Bar Council (PBC) has issued a White Paper calling for reform
of the judiciary and restoration of the country's constitution. The PBC,
the legal profession's regulatory body, released the White Paper in the
Punjabi city of Lahore, on Saturday. "For the past three years, we have
been struggling for the restoration of the constitution as it existed on
the 10 October 1999, before the military coup carried out by Gen Pervez
Musharraf," PBC Vice-Chairman Mian Abbas Ahmed told IRIN from Multan in
Punjab Province.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35075&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN]

PAKISTAN: 184 Afghan families leave Chaman waiting area

One hundred and eighty-four families left the Chaman waiting area on the
border with Afghanistan in the southwestern Pakistani province of
Balochistan on Monday as moves to close the controversial settlement. "The
whole day went very smoothly," a spokesman for the office of the UN High
Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Jack Redden, told IRIN in the capital,
Islamabad. The Afghans were given a choice of either staying inside
Pakistan at the Mohammad Kheyl camp or relocating to the Zarey Dasht camp
in the southern Afghan province of Kandahar.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35078&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN]

PAKISTAN: First National Human Development Report launched

The United Nations Development Fund's first National Human Development
Report on Pakistan was launched in the capital, Islamabad, on Tuesday,
highlighting dangerous work for low pay, child labour, and poor health and
education. The report, which took two years to put together, found that
women and children were the most vulnerable and rural Pakistanis at a
disadvantage compared to their urban counterparts. The document is the
first comprehensive audit of Pakistani social, health, education and
economic conditions.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35132&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN]

PAKISTAN: Water shortage causes skin ailments in Karachi

Nearly 500 people living in coastal communities near the southern port
city of Karachi have been diagnosed with ailments caused by the poor
quality and shortage of water, health and environment officials said on
Wednesday. A press release issued by a local organisation working for the
rights of the fishing community, the Pakistan Fisher Folk Forum (PFF),
said it had organised a medical camp earlier in the week where hundreds of
people were diagnosed with skin and eye allergies, as well as fever,
caused by polluted water.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35131&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN]

TAJIKISTAN: Water conference calls for regional cooperation

A two-day international conference held in Tajikistan's eastern city of
Khorugh, ended on Monday, with experts calling for more regional
cooperation to resolve the huge issue of water resources in the region.
"Water is a key economic resource and we need to set the politics aside
and make rational decisions," John Baxter, a water management expert with
the US Agency for International Development, told IRIN in the city,
capital of the eastern Badakhshoni Kuhi Province. The five post-Soviet
Central Asian states of Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and
Turkmenistan wrestle with sharing limited water resources and the regional
environmental degradation caused by the shrinking of the Aral Sea.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35076&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TAJIKISTAN]

TAJIKISTAN: WFP closes Pamir aid corridor to Afghanistan

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) has halted logistics operations in
Tajikistan's eastern border crossing of Ishkashim, thus closing one of its
major Central Asian aid corridors to Afghanistan. "We are adapting to new
realities, and now that the food emergency is over in Afghanistan, we have
to look at cost-effective ways of providing supplies," Ardag Meghdessian,
WFP's country director, told IRIN in the Tajik capital, Dushanbe.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35157&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TAJIKISTAN]

TURKMENISTAN: Testing the Amudar'ya river to improve water quality

The first comprehensive and systematic survey of water quality on the
Turkmen stretch of the mighty Amudar'ya river - one of Central Asia's key
water sources - is under way, IRIN learnt on Tuesday. "The Tajiks and
Uzbeks are doing nothing, there's nobody dealing with water quality on the
river, so we need proper information in order to move forward," Ashir
Muhamedoo, the chief of the Amudar'ya middle water authority, told IRIN in
Turkmenabad.

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35106&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TURKMENISTAN]

TURKMENISTAN: Rights groups slam government over dual nationality

International rights groups have strongly criticised the government of
Turkmen President Saparmyrat Niyazov over its recent handling of a
controversial dual nationality debate with Moscow. In what could be a
further bid to isolate Turkmenistan's five million inhabitants, thousands
of ethnic Russians holding dual nationality were required to forfeit one
of them, thereby adding to what many believe to be an already poor human
rights record. "The IHF [International Helsinki Federation for Human
Rights] is deeply concerned about the entire human rights situation in
Turkmenistan, of which the dual citizenship issue is a part," Aaron
Rhodes, the IHF executive director, told IRIN from Vienna, describing the
rights situation there as a "catastrophe".

[For a complete copy of this report see:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35129&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TURKMENISTAN]


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