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 120
12 - 18 July 2003


CONTENTS:


AFGHANISTAN: Key humanitarian route closes for upgrading
AFGHANISTAN: Mudslides and other disasters underline lack of preparedness
AFGHANISTAN: NATO prepares to take ISAF command
AFGHANISTAN: Red Cross report says donors put politics before need
AFGHANISTAN: More pro-democracy demonstrations
PAKISTAN: Hazaras call for more security
PAKISTAN: New study suggests Afghan war has led to increase in HIV/AIDS
PAKISTAN: Afghan refugees continue returning despite border disputes
TURKMENISTAN: Providing health services on the Afghan border
TAJIKISTAN: Interview with key development minister
TAJIKISTAN: Focus on family planning
KYRGYZSTAN: Diseases related to iodine deficiency increasing in south
KAZAKHSTAN: Solar energy initiative launched
CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap



AFGHANISTAN: Key humanitarian route closes for upgrading

The principal humanitarian route linking the capital Kabul and northern
Afghanistan will be closed for three months for badly-needed
reconstruction work ahead of the winter, a government official has told
IRIN. The Salang tunnel - about 180 km north of Kabul - is the main access
route from the capital and the only all-weather direct route between the
north and south of the country. It was used extensively by aid convoys
from Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan and played an important role
in keeping central parts of the country fed, since it was reopened last
year following war damage and neglect.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35437&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Mudslides and other disasters underline lack of preparedness

Following deadly flooding in southern and northeastern provinces of
Afghanistan last week that left more than 100 dead or missing, the UN
reported on Sunday that more people were feared killed after serious
mudslides in the Shibar district of the central Bamian Province. "The
situation is considered serious with up to 19 people missing," Manoel de
Almieda e Silva, a UN Assistant Mission for Afghanistan (UNAMA) spokesman,
told IRIN in the Afghan capital, Kabul. According to the spokesman, an
evaluation team composed of UNAMA, the Office of the UN High Commissioner
for Refugees (UNHCR) and government officials had gone to the area on
Saturday to assess damage in the Ghandak valley of Bamian Province.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35360&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: NATO prepares to take ISAF command

The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) - is preparing to take over
the command of the UN-mandated 4,500-strong International Security
Assistance Force (ISAF) for Afghanistan on 11 August. More than 50 NATO
troops are already setting up their headquarters in the Afghan capital,
Kabul. "We are pretty much on track, and we have also initiated quite an
extensive programme of briefing for the ambassadors of NATO member
states," NATO spokesman, Mark Laity told IRIN on Friday from the
alliance's headquarters in Brussels. Laity added that key staff were
receiving special briefings on security and politics in Afghanistan.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35493&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: Red Cross report says donors put politics before need

A Red Cross report released on Thursday criticised Western governments for
focusing humanitarian assistance on Iraq and countries associated with the
'war on terrorism' at the cost of other crises, but aid workers in
Afghanistan warned that even the benefits of this international attention
can be short-lived. The International Federation of Red Cross and Red
Crescent Societies' "World Disasters Report 2003" said that humanitarian
intervention was increasingly driven by political priorities and less
according to need. This leads, the document said, to disproportionate
amounts of money temporarily pouring into countries where Western
governments have been involved in conflict, such as Afghanistan.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35453&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: More pro-democracy demonstrations

Afghans in the capital Kabul have again been exercising their right to
protest. Chanting pro-democracy slogans, around a hundred people marched
through the city on Tuesday morning. The demonstrators called for the
implementation of the Bonn agreement - a road map for Afghanistan's
peaceful development - and urged the Afghan government not to bow to
extremists. "We don't want fundamentalism," one participant told IRIN.
Others said they wanted a constitution based on democracy and the rule of
law.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35401&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN

PAKISTAN: Hazaras call for more security

Hazara Shia community leaders have called for increased security, despite
life returning to normal following a Sunni militant attack on a mosque in
the southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta on 4 July. The Lashkar-e-Jhangvi
organisation claimed responsibility for the attack in which 60 people
died. "We are not satisfied with the security arrangements, because now
the military is on the street but as soon as they leave definitely we are
going to have a law and order situation here," Sardar Sadat Ali, a Hazara
politician told IRIN from Quetta on Thursday.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35458&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN

PAKISTAN: New study suggests Afghan war has led to increase in HIV/AIDS

A recent US study has suggested that the war in Afghanistan in 2001 led to
a higher HIV risk among drug users in neighbouring Pakistan and warns that
immediate action is needed to prevent an epidemic. The study's principal
author, Dr Steffanie Strathdee, said the report highlighted how the
effects of military action can be more far-reaching than initial casualty
assessments show. "Our study illustrates how complex emergencies like war
can directly or indirectly exacerbate vulnerabilities to infectious
diseases, in this case by leading to increases in needle sharing,"
Strathdee told IRIN from the John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public
Health in Baltimore, USA.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35386&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN

PAKISTAN: Afghan refugees continue returning despite border disputes

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) announced at
the weekend that it has facilitated the return of more than 200,000 Afghan
refugees from Pakistan to Afghanistan so far this year. Despite this,
agency officials believe that only about half of the estimated 600,000
returns planned for this year will actually take place. "It's been pretty
consistent at this rate since early May," UNHCR spokesman Jack Redden told
IRIN in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, on Monday. Redden said that the
ongoing border skirmishes between Afghan and Pakistani forces along the
eastern Afghan border in Nangarhar Province, and the ransacking of the
Pakistani embassy in the Afghan capital, Kabul, had not adversely affected
the refugee flow.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35365&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN

TURKMENISTAN: Providing health services on the Afghan border

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), in conjunction with the
Turkmen government and USAID, has been working to provide reproductive
health facilities in the southeast of the desert nation in order to bring
care to isolated communities and assist Afghans living on or near the
border, an official of UNFPA has told IRIN. "With resources the way they
are in neighbouring Afghanistan, UNFPA Turkmenistan has been trying to
offer reproductive health facilities to thousands of Afghans who cross
into the country looking for hospitals or clinics," UNFPA National
Programme Officer Ezizgeldy Hellenov told IRIN in the second city of
Turkmenabad.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35460&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TURKMENISTAN

TAJIKISTAN: Interview with key development minister

As Deputy Prime Minister responsible for humanitarian and development
affairs, Zokir Vazirov is one of the key members of the government of
Tajikistan. He was the education minister in former Soviet Tajikistan and
held the same position after independence in 1992. With a PhD degree in
the history of social philosophy, he has in-depth understanding of the
multifaceted challenges his impoverished mountainous nation faces today.
In an interview with IRIN, Vazirov said Tajikistan needed increased
international assistance for local governments and agriculture. He said
that such help was also required in fighting drug smuggling because
Tajikistan is a front line state in the war on drugs. The Central Asian
country is one of the major transit routes for opium produced in
neighbouring Afghanistan. Vazirov also said that the Iraq crisis adversely
affected the fragile Tajik economy because of fluctuations in global oil
markets.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35438&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TAJIKISTAN

TAJIKISTAN: Focus on family planning

Waiting in the narrow entrance hall of the local reproductive health
centre, Mehri Zanjirbekova, a Tajik nearing forty, is clear her
child-bearing days are over. "I already have five children and it's
increasingly difficult to look after them. I think it is very important to
have effective family planning," she told IRIN in Khorog, capital of the
Gorno-Badakhshan Province in eastern Tajikistan. Married in 1985,
Zanjirbekova, a housewife, is concerned about the welfare of her family.
"We don't even have enough to eat and we have to look after the education
and health of our children," she said. Working in a local factory, her
husband earns US $20 a month, but that income is not regular, as sometimes
he is not paid for months.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35389&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=TAJIKISTAN


KYRGYZSTAN: Diseases related to iodine deficiency increasing in south

Iodine deficiency in southern Kyrgyzstan continues to be a source of
concern among health officials in the region, IRIN has been told. Madina
is 20 years old and lives in the southern regional capital of Osh. Despite
repeated requests, she is reluctant to marry. "I will think about marriage
when I get cured," she told IRIN, trying to withhold her tears. Madina
suffers from iodine deficiency and goitre - an acute swelling of the
thyroid gland - and is afraid of giving birth to a physically or mentally
disabled child.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35494&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=KYRGYZSTAN

KAZAKHSTAN: Solar energy initiative launched

Kazakhstan launched its first solar energy project in the Kazakh
commercial capital of Almaty on Tuesday. Funded by the UN Development
Programme (UNDP) and the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA),
the move is seen as a major first step in promoting clean and efficient
energy usage in Central Asia's largest nation. As part of the initial
scheme, 1,500 residents are set to benefit from the programme. If
successful, the heat and hot-water system could be replicated at suitable
locations throughout the country of 15 million.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35402&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=KAZAKHSTAN

CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap

A powerful earthquake shook Tajikistan on Sunday. The epicentre of the
quake, measuring 4-5 on the 12-point [Mercalli] scale, was reported to be
located 160 km northeast of the capital, Dushanbe. There were no reports
of casualties or damage. On Monday, Tajik agriculture minister Tursun
Rahmatov was reported as saying that the locust was no longer a threat to
agricultural crops in the country, owing to the financial assistance of
the UN in the elimination of the pests. The same day, the Tajik government
and the UN World Food Programme (WFP) signed an agreement under which WFP
would provide food aid to the country. The document was signed by the
Tajik foreign minister, Talbak Nazarov, and the head of WFP in Tajikistan,
Ardag Meghdessian.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=35490&SelectRegion=Central_Asia&SelectCountry=CENTRAL_ASIA


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