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Asia
IRIN-AS Weekly Round-Up 27
2 - 8 July 2005


CONTENTS:

AFGHANISTAN: Interview with rural development minister
AFGHANISTAN: Tough road for women standing for election
AFGHANISTAN: Last ex-combatant disarmed under DDR
CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap
KYRGYZSTAN-UZBEKISTAN: Focus on Andijan asylum seekers
KYRGYZSTAN: More assistance needed in flooded south
NEPAL: Displacement contributing to child labour problem
NEPAL: Fall in tourist numbers causing concern
PAKISTAN: Five dead, 10,000 displaced in northern flooding
PAKISTAN: Flood-hit communities still in dire need
UZBEKISTAN: Pressure on international NGOs and independent media grows


AFGHANISTAN: Interview with rural development minister

Most of rural Afghanistan continues to suffer from food insecurity and a
lack of government input. In an exclusive interview with IRIN, Mohammad
Hanif Atmar, Afghan Minister of Rural Rehabilitation and Development,
said that despite billions of dollars worth of reconstruction over three
years, rural areas continue to face huge challenges.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=47941&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN


AFGHANISTAN: Tough road for women standing for election

Female candidates hoping to stand in the forthcoming parliamentary
elections scheduled for September, say poor security and strong
conservative traditions are hampering their ability to compete in the
historic poll. Women wanting to stand in the election, particularly in
rural areas, said they had been warned to withdraw their candidacy,
either verbally or by letter.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=47999&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN


AFGHANISTAN: Last ex-combatant disarmed under DDR

Afghan government and the United Nations celebrated the end of the
disarmament and demobilisation phase of the UN-backed Disarmament
Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR) as the last ex-militia member was
disarmed at a ceremony in the capital, Kabul, on Thursday. "I am proud
to have surrendered my arm to the president of my country, I hope I will
now join the reconstruction Jihad [holy war]," said Jalalludin, a former
officer of the 717 Kabul brigade and the last Afghan ex-combatant in
DDR. He was speaking immediately after surrendering his AK 47 to
president Hamid Karzai as a symbolic move to mark the formal end of
disarmament.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48029&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=AFGHANISTAN


CENTRAL ASIA: Weekly news wrap

Voters in Kyrgyzstan go to the presidential polls on Sunday in what many
see as a new era of openness and hope in the former Soviet republic.
Thousands of protesters ousted ex-president Askar Akayev and his
government in March following flawed parliamentary polls. While five
candidates for the country's top job will contest the polls, analysts
agree that the likely winner will be Kurmanbek Bakiev, prime minister,
acting president and a clear frontrunner in the polls.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48033&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=CENTRAL_ASIA


KYRGYZSTAN-UZBEKISTAN: Focus on Andijan asylum seekers

Hundreds of Uzbek asylum seekers in southern Kyrgyzstan appear resigned
to not seeing their homeland again for years and are looking forward to
a rosier future following indications from the office for United Nations
High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) that they may soon be settled in
a third country. "Thanks Allah, at last we have something.
One-and-a-half months ago we had nothing, that was the worst thing," a
young woman from the eastern Uzbek city of Andijan said in the
Sasyk-Bulak camp. The camp is in the Suzak district of the southern
Kyrgyz province of Jalal-Abad.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=47979&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=KYRGYZSTAN-UZBEKISTAN


KYRGYZSTAN: More assistance needed in flooded south

United Nations agencies, including the UN Development Programme (UNDP),
the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), office of the UN High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR) and the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) have been providing
relief to local residents in the southern Kyrgyzstan district of Nookat
affected by recent mudflows. The district is about 60 km southwest of
the provincial capital, Osh. The government has requested that urgent
aid be sent to the Nookat district, including blankets, bedding, tents,
diesel, fuel, medicine and food to meet its immediate needs after
flooding and mudflows destroyed houses, bridges and highways, the UN
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48018&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=KYRGYZSTAN


NEPAL: Displacement contributing to child labour problem

Ten years ago, when Nepal signed an agreement with the International
Labour Organization (ILO) to launch a national programme to eliminate
child labour, there were real hopes that the scourge could be
significantly reduced. But today activists say that the number of
working children in the Himalayan kingdom has increased rather than gone
down, in part because of the conditions created by the current
insurgency. "The conflict has had a serious negative impact on our past
efforts, and the challenges are enormous today," said long-time child
labour activist, Uddhab Poudel from ILO. Poudel added that as the
insurgency forces more children to leave their villages, the problem of
child labour worsens.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=47943&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=NEPAL


NEPAL: Fall in tourist numbers causing concern

The nine year insurgency in Nepal has had a serious impact on the
tourism industry which the government is doing little to tackle
according to sources within the business. They blame falling tourist
numbers on the conflict that has cost at least 11,000 lives. "We can no
longer say that this is our largest industry anymore," said Rabi Poudel
from the Nepal Association of Tour and Travel Agents (NATTA).

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=47994&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=NEPAL


PAKISTAN: Five dead, 10,000 displaced in northern flooding

At least five people have been killed and nearly 10,000 people have been
displaced after two weeks of heavy flooding in Pakistan's North West
Frontier Province (NWFP), the provincial relief department said on
Monday. According to meteorologists, unusual weather conditions
including the heaviest snowfall in the region for over a century, have
combined to cause the problems and created severe flooding along the
Kabul and Swat rivers.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=47959&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN


PAKISTAN: Flood-hit communities still in dire need

Flood-affected populations along 60 to 70 km of the Kabul Kabul River in
Pakistan's North West Frontier Province (NWFP) remain in dire need of
daily rations and shelter, according to humanitarian workers in the
Peshawar, Charsadda and Nowshera districts of the province. There's also
a high risk of disease outbreak in the absence of proper medical
facilities as stomach and skin related diseases are on increase in
flood-hit areas. "The flood affected families include mostly daily wage
labourers and small farmers whose mud-houses have been either demolished
or are not in a liveable condition after the water has receded.
Moreover, there is a dire shortage of edible items at the moment since
these poor people sustain on daily basis for rations," said Maulvi
Mehboob-ur-Rehman, coordinator of the flood relief efforts of
Karachi-based charity, Al-Rashid Trust speaking from the provincial
capital, Peshawar.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=48028&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=PAKISTAN


UZBEKISTAN: Pressure on international NGOs and independent media grows

Following a year-long campaign to limit the activities of Western NGOs,
Uzbek authorities have brought criminal charges against local staff of
the Internews Network, a US based non-profit media organisation, the
organisation said in a statement issued on Tuesday. "On Monday the Uzbek
government formally charged local Internews Network staff with
conspiracy to engage in productions of videos and publications of
informational materials without the necessary licenses," the statement
said. "Two local women staff, a former Internews director and an
accountant, are charged with violating Article 190(2) b of the Uzbek
criminal code, a crime punishable by up to six months in prison," the
statement read.

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=47980&SelectRegion=Asia&SelectCountry=UZBEKISTAN


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2005


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