Weekly Round-Up - IRINCAS-135: 31-Oct-03
U N I T E D N A T I O N S
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Central Asia
IRIN-CA Weekly Round-up 135
25 - 31 October 2003
AFGHANISTAN: Poppy cultivation continues unabated
AFGHANISTAN: First international peacekeeping forces deployed outside Kabul
AFGHANISTAN: Interview with disarmed combatant
AFGHANISTAN-PAKISTAN: Focus on bilateral border dispute
CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap
IRAN: Tehran moves toward Kyoto treaty
KYRGYZSTAN: Typhoid cases reported in the south
KYRGYZSTAN: Two suspected anthrax cases hospitalised
PAKISTAN: Focus on aftermath of oil spill
PAKISTAN: Rights groups fear for lives of Sindhi couple
PAKISTAN: Focus on renewed debate over faith-based laws
TAJIKISTAN: Labour migration continues to play key role
TAJIKISTAN: Typhoid outbreak under control
UZBEKISTAN: Andizhan Children's Fund offers hope to disabled
UZBEKISTAN: Regional seminar on treatment and rehabilitation of drug addicts under way
AFGHANISTAN: Poppy cultivation continues unabated
Poppy cultivation in beleaguered Afghanistan continues to grow, despite
efforts to curb its spread, a report by the United Nations Office on Drugs
and Crime (UNODC) has revealed. In its annual survey, the Vienna-based
agency found that opium poppy was now being planted in 28 of the country's
32 provinces. "This report sends the message that the international
community must act now to prevent the country turning again into a 'failed
state'," Mirella Dummar Frahi, an external relations officer for the
agency, told IRIN on Thursday from UNODC headquarters in Vienna.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37552&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN: First international peacekeeping forces deployed outside
Kabul
Following continual calls by aid workers and Afghans alike for the
expansion of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) outside
the confines of the Afghan capital, Kabul, the first ISAF forces were
deployed to the northeastern city of Konduz on Saturday. Afghan President
Hamid Karzai has long demanded that the 5,000-strong force's mandate be
expanded to help him reassert his control beyond Kabul.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37464&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN: Interview with disarmed combatant
The disarmament of the country's over 100,000 ex-combatants is considered
crucial to its future stabilisation. Observers remain concerned over how
successful the UN-backed disarmament demobilisation and reintegration
programme (DDR) effort will be, and whether the ex-combatants are
genuinely ready to give up their weapons and join civilian life. In an
interview with IRIN, Mohammad Ibrahim, an ex-combatant recently disarmed
during the first phase of the DDR pilot project initiated in the
northeastern city of Konduz, said everyone in his battalion had wanted to
be included in the first 1,000 to be disarmed.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37467&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN
AFGHANISTAN-PAKISTAN: Focus on bilateral border dispute
Senior Pakistani, Afghan and US diplomats and military officials jointly
visited the Pakistan-Afghanistan border last Saturday to ascertain where
the boundary should lie, according to a US army statement issued from the
Bagram airbase in Afghanistan on Wednesday. Mandated by a six-month-old
tripartite commission tasked with resolving problems on the controversial
border, the officials visited four border posts on the Afghan side in
Nangarhar Province, having earlier visited the area in July to confirm
locations, confirmed by satellite pictures, for three Pakistani posts, the
statement said.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37551&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN-PAKISTAN
CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap
Twenty-six confirmed cases of typhoid were reported in the southern Kyrgyz
province of Batken on Thursday, seen by Kyrgyz health officials as a
probable extension of a recent outbreak of the disease in neighbouring
Tajikistan, in which hundreds of confirmed cases have been registered in
the Tajik capital, Dushanbe. On Wednesday, Kyrgyzstan strongly rebuffed
the European Parliament's criticism of the country's human rights record.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37566&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=CENTRAL_ASIA
IRAN: Tehran moves toward Kyoto treaty
Iran took another step towards signing the landmark Kyoto treaty, which
aims to cut global warming, with the participation of government and oil
industry officials in a UN-supported workshop aimed at studying the impact
signing up would have on the oil-rich country. The Kyoto treaty has been
ratified by 119 countries so far, but Iran is one of 11 member countries
of The Organisation of Petroleum Export Countries (OPEC) who are stalling.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37554&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=IRAN
KYRGYZSTAN: Typhoid cases reported in the south
Twenty-six confirmed cases of typhoid have been reported in the southern
Kyrgyz province of Batken, which is seen by Kyrgyz health experts as a
probable extension of a recent outbreak of the disease in neighbouring
Tajikistan. "There are 26 confirmed cases of typhoid in the Batken
Province as of today," Elena Bayalinova, the head of the Kyrgyz health
ministry's press centre told IRIN from the capital, Bishkek on Thursday.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37555&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=KYRGYZSTAN
KYRGYZSTAN: Two suspected anthrax cases hospitalised
Two people suspected of having contracted the cutaneous form of anthrax
have been recently hospitalised in the Barpy village of the southwestern
province of Jalal-Abad. "These people took part in slaughtering a cow. The
meat of an infected animal was further sent to a sausage shop without any
veterinary certificate, while some other edible parts were distributed
among relatives, and entrails buried," Tatiana Samsonova, the acting
deputy director at the Kyrgyz health ministry's centre for quarantine and
dangerous infectious diseases, told IRIN on Friday. In total, 46 people,
including 16 children, were said to have consumed the infected meat.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37571&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=KYRGYZSTAN
PAKISTAN: Focus on aftermath of oil spill
Tahir Qureshi clambered on board a launch moored just off a rocky outcrop
on the east coast of Karachi, the boat see-sawing dangerously as one of
the crew grabbed a hand and guided the ecosystems specialist from the
International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) on board.
"Careful how you step - last week, we had a visitor who fell into this
water," Qureshi told this correspondent, pointing downwards to seawater
clearly flecked with oil, as well as other, even more dubious substances.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37535&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
PAKISTAN: Rights groups fear for lives of Sindhi couple
The lives of a young couple in rural Sindh, who wed each other against the
wishes of their respective tribes, might be in danger unless the
authorities act swiftly to protect them from their irate kin, according to
a rights activist. "Rights groups have petitioned the Sukkur bench of the
Sindh High Court to take sou moto [as a matter of extreme urgency] notice
of events," Nadia Haroon, the Sindh programme coordinator of the Human
Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), told IRIN from the southern port
city of Karachi.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37506&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
PAKISTAN: Focus on renewed debate over faith-based laws
Since October 2002, 18-year-old Nazia Bashir has been fighting a rape case
that could, if she loses, lead to her being charged with adultery and
sentenced to 100 lashes or death by stoning under Pakistan's Hudud
(singular: hadd), or Islamic criminal code, laws. Nazia worked in the
southern port city of Karachi, teaching the Koran to girls at a madrasah
co-owned by Maulvi Nazir, whom she has accused of raping her.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37481&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN
TAJIKISTAN: Labour migration continues to play key role
Labour migration continues to play a pivotal role in Tajikistan, a country
grappling with crippling poverty and unemployment ever since independence
in 1991 followed by five years of civil war. "Labour migration from
Tajikistan is the key issue touching all spheres, including the political
and economic," Muzafar Zaripov, a programme officer and focal point for
labour migration for the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) in
the capital, Dushanbe, told IRIN on Wednesday. "The most active part of
[the] population are labour migrants working abroad."
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37526&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TAJIKISTAN
TAJIKISTAN: Typhoid outbreak under control
A recent typhoid outbreak in the capital, Dushanbe - one of the largest
outbreaks to strike the country in years - is now under control, according
to a World Health Organisation (WHO) official. "The situation is now under
control," Dr Nazira Artykova, a WHO liaison officer, told IRIN from
Dushanbe on Monday, confirming that at least one person had officially
died of the disease. According to latest figures, there were 390 confirmed
cases and 958 suspected cases of the disease after a major supply of piped
water became infected in the north of the city, she explained.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37485&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TAJIKISTAN
UZBEKISTAN: Andizhan Children's Fund offers hope to disabled
Two years ago, things were not looking good for Mamura Mamadaliyeva.
Suffering from arthritis, a debilitating disease of the joints, the
43-year-old mother of four living in the village of Gulistan in the
eastern Uzbek province of Andizhan could barely move, much less take care
of herself. Her life changed, however, after her arrival at a training and
manufacturing centre, established by a local Uzbek NGO, the Andizhan
Children's Fund (ACF).
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37508&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=UZBEKISTAN
UZBEKISTAN: Regional seminar on treatment and rehabilitation of drug
addicts under way
A regional seminar on the treatment and rehabilitation of drug addicts is
now under way in the Uzbek capital, Tashkent. "The originality [of the
seminar] is that there will be broadly presented all the current models of
rehabilitating drug addicts," Mirzakhid Sultanov, the regional project
coordinator at the United Nations Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC), told
IRIN from Tashkent, adding that all theoretical and practical aspects of
rehabilitating addicts would be presented.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=37518&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=UZBEKISTAN
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