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-CAS Weekly Round-Up 180
4 - 10 September 2004


CONTENTS:

AFGHANISTAN: UNICEF provides education opportunity for out-of-school girls
AFGHANISTAN: Addiction: Drug abuse in Kabul city and beyond
AFGHANISTAN: Interview with the governor of Nangarhar province on poppy
   cultivation
AFGHANISTAN: Some 7,000 people suffering from scabies in northeast
AFGHANISTAN: Day in the life of an addict
AFGHANISTAN-PAKISTAN: Displaced in Wana say they are receiving little
   support
AFGHANISTAN: UN helps to improve literacy
AFGHANISTAN: Interview with female opium farmer
CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap
IRAN: Failure to confront Afghan heroin leads to growing domestic drug
   problem
PAKISTAN: UNHCR ends assistance to "new" refugee camps
PAKISTAN: New report calls for action on youth suicides
PAKISTAN: Nationwide literacy campaign vital - UNESCO
TAJIKISTAN: Interview with media activist
TAJIKISTAN: Clean water restored to most of the capital
TAJIKISTAN: UNIFEM working to empower female farmers
TAJIKISTAN: Civic education programme extended for another 5 years
TURKMENISTAN: National breast-feeding campaign concludes


AFGHANISTAN: UNICEF provides education opportunity for out-of-school girls

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), together with the Afghan
Education Ministry, has started a community-based schools programme in
remote areas of the country. The programme will provide learning
opportunities for those girls who cannot attend formal schools.
"Community-based schools will be an important method of bringing education
closer to girls who currently live too far away from a formal school."




AFGHANISTAN: Addiction: Drug abuse in Kabul city and beyond

Afghanistan is trying to pick up the pieces after more than two decades of
violent and socially destabilising civil war. Already one of the poorest
countries in the world, the years of war have compounded the challenges
facing modernisation of a primarily agrarian society with feudalistic and
traditionalist social relations. Afghanistan is by far the world's leading
supplier of opiates, with more than 1.7 million farmers estimated to be
involved in opium production.




AFGHANISTAN: Interview with the governor of Nangarhar province on poppy
cultivation

While the central government has started its controversial poppy
eradication campaign in parts of the country where cultivation is rife,
some provincial leaders believe the campaign could be counter-productive
if alternative livelihoods are not provided for farmers. Nangarhar is one
of the main poppy growing provinces in the country. This eastern province
was the first target of this year's eradication campaign.




AFGHANISTAN: Some 7,000 people suffering from scabies in northeast

An outbreak of scabies in the northeastern province of Badakhshan has
affected at least 7,000 people, according to the World Health Organization
(WHO). "WHO estimates that the disease has impacted on 7,000 residents in
Nusai district in Badakhshan province." Scabies is a fairly common
infectious disease of the skin caused by a mite, producing pimple-like
irritations.




AFGHANISTAN: Day in the life of an addict

Kabul has an estimated 30,000 opium addicts. In the isolated ruins of an
old building, Suhail, a 28-year-old drug addict, sits on piles of rubbish
surrounded by hundreds of flies. He is preparing to smoke his first
10-gram heroin dose of the day. It costs Suhail 250 afghanis (US $5) to
buy his daily supply of heroin powder. "I often steal or beg for money if
there is no work."




AFGHANISTAN-PAKISTAN: Displaced in Wana say they are receiving little
support

Residents of Pakistan's northwestern conflict-hit tribal belt of Wana have
complained that no relief or human rights agency have acted to stem the
deteriorating humanitarian situation following a military operation in the
area designed to root out militants and those supporting them.
"Humanitarian organisations should have dispatched their teams and
representatives to assess the loss of civilian lives, the demolition of
houses, the disruption of livelihoods and the destruction of agriculture
in the area."




AFGHANISTAN: UN helps to improve literacy

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and the United Nations
Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) are helping the
Afghan Education Ministry to raise literacy levels in this war-torn
country. A UNICEF survey in 2003 showed that the male literacy rate was 49
percent while female literacy was only 19.6 percent. "The literacy rate is
very low in Afghanistan and it is important to raise it if we want to
develop the country."




AFGHANISTAN: Interview with female opium farmer

Poppy cultivation remains the leading high-income business in Afghanistan,
partly because many poverty stricken farmers say it is the only means of
survival open to them. In an interview with IRIN, Bibi Deendaray, a
55-year widow, cultivating opium in the Dand district of the southern city
of Kandahar, said she supported her 20-member family through poppy
cultivation. The woman, who farms under a hectare of land, said in the
absence of any alternative livelihood, she was faced with no choice but to
grow the illegal crop.




CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap

Another 33 people allegedly involved in a spate of violence that left
almost 50 dead in Uzbekistan in March and April have gone on trial, AFP
reported on Tuesday. Two separate trials began in the capital, Tashkent,
one of 15 people including eight women and one involving two people. On
Monday, another trial of 16 people on related charges got under way in the
ancient city of Bukhara.




IRAN: Failure to confront Afghan heroin leads to growing domestic drug
problem

Last year, 124,670 kg of drugs were seized by the Iranian authorities. The
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) estimates that this is
only 15 per cent of the total amount pouring across the border. More than
3,600 Iranians have been killed in gun battles with smugglers in the last
25 years and every year thousands of kilograms of heroin, opium and
hashish stream through these porous mountain passes.




PAKISTAN: UNHCR ends assistance to "new" refugee camps

The office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has completed
processing the last of some 82,000 Afghan refugees wishing to repatriate
from "new" camps in Pakistan located near the Afghan border, where the
agency has ended its assistance. The UN agency and the government of
Pakistan had announced in July that all assistance in the 15 "new" camps
housing around 190,000 Afghans would end on 1 September due to increasing
security concerns because of unrest in neighbouring areas of Afghanistan.




PAKISTAN: New report calls for action on youth suicides

With a huge adolescent population - because of its high level of fertility
over the last few decades - this poor South Asian country has seen 1,160
people take their lives in the first six months of the year. According to
data collected by Lawyers for Human Rights and Legal Aid (LHRLA), a
non-governmental organisation, most of them were aged between eight and
25. The deaths were in addition to 691 attempted suicides.




PAKISTAN: Nationwide literacy campaign vital - UNESCO

Pakistan needs to launch a robust national social movement in order to
achieve the Education For All (EFA) target of 86 percent adult literacy by
2015. "This is an immense task but it is feasible if we work in a focused
way. The social sector, especially education, has not received in the past
the necessary attention it deserved. Now it's time to accelerate efforts
for the promotion of literacy [and to put them] on a war footing."




TAJIKISTAN: Interview with media activist

Press freedom is becoming of increasing concern in Tajikistan, which until
now had more favourable conditions for the media than its Central Asian
neighbours. Local observers and media activists say the deterioration is
linked to forthcoming parliamentary elections in February 2005 with
independent media outlets facing growing pressure from the authorities.




TAJIKISTAN: Clean water restored to most of the capital

Piped water in the Tajik capital Dushanbe can now be consumed after
boiling, following floods and landslides in the country in July that left
more than half of the city's population without access to safe drinking
water. But infrastructure such as bridges and roads in the rest of
Tajikistan remains damaged. "The water is back to normal." However, the
mayor of Dushanbe recently stated that water from the Varzob river, a
major source for the Tajik capital, was not suitable for human consumption
in the long term.




TAJIKISTAN: UNIFEM working to empower female farmers

According to the Tajik Statistics Committee, only 6 percent of farms
nationwide are run by women. They say that in 1996, when collective and
state farms were broken up into private ventures, they were overlooked,
with no support given in terms of credit and know-how to get them heading
their own farms. The need to economically empower Tajik rural women has
never been greater.




TAJIKISTAN: Civic education programme extended for another 5 years

A project educating children about democracy and civil rights has been
extended for another five years in Tajikistan. More than 25,000 school
students are expected to master the basics of civic education. "Textbooks
on civic education have been published in Tajik, Russian and Uzbek and
this complementary schoolbook will help our children to have a thorough
idea of what elections are, what a democratic state is, what their rights
are."




TURKMENISTAN: National breast-feeding campaign concludes

A national breast-feeding promotion campaign has been under way in
Turkmenistan, aimed at raising the population's awareness of its
significance and benefits. this was the second annual national
breast-feeding week, held in the first week of September. The week-long
promotional campaign aimed at drawing public attention to the issue has
been carried out by UNICEF and the Turkmen government in all the country's
provinces.




IRIN-Asia
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Fax: +92-51-2292918
Email: IrinAsia@irin.org.pk

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