Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2000 16:16:45 +0300 (BEAUT)
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CENTRAL ASIA: IRIN News Briefs, 16 October

CONTENTS:

AFGHANISTAN: UNHCR reports rapid influx of Afghans into Pakistan
AFGHANISTAN: Heavy fighting rages in northeast
AFGHANISTAN: Taliban accuses Northern Alliance of ceasefire violations
UZBEKISTAN: President softens stance on Taliban
UZBEKISTAN: Afghan, Uzbek ambassadors meet again
UZBEKISTAN: President slates idea of Eurasian Economic Community
PAKISTAN: Japan provides aid to drought victims
TAJIKISTAN: Unemployment high and rising, says Labour Minister


AFGHANISTAN: UNHCR reports rapid influx of Afghans into Pakistan

UNHCR reported on Friday that a large number of Afghans have crossed into
Pakistan to escape fighting in northeastern Afghanistan. UNHCR spokesman
Kris Janowski in Geneva called it "the single largest one-week influx this
year." From 1 October to 12 October, there were 3,783 new arrivals,
including 2,127 children, 943 women and 713 men, UNHCR regional
spokesperson Yusuf Hassan told IRIN on Monday.  Since the beginning of
September, there had been nearly 10,000 new arrivals, Hassan said. From
Thursday to Saturday, approximately 8,000 refugees were moved to the new
Shamshatu camp, about 35 km southeast of Peshawar, he added.

Hassan told IRIN that 130 refugees had been located who had trekked 600km
from Taloqan, a former stronghold of the Northern Alliance in Takhar
province that was taken by the Taliban on 6 September after fierce
fighting.  The refugees, now at the old Khairabad refugee camp 50km east
of Peshawar, were in especially bad condition, Hassan said. 

AFGHANISTAN:  Heavy fighting rages in northeast

The Taliban movement and opposition Northern Alliance forces were on
Monday locked in heavy fighting in northeastern Afghanistan, close to the
border with Tajikistan, Agence France Presse (AFP) reported. Forces loyal
to former defence minister Ahmad Shah Masood, who mounted a
counter-offensive on Friday, were attacking Taliban positions around
Taloqan, AFP quoted Northern Alliance spokesman Mohammad Habeel as saying.
Masood's counter-attack was aimed at recapturing strategic areas lost to
the Taliban around Takhar since early September, it said.

According to Habeel, opposition forces captured large areas in the
Khwajaghar district of Takhar, as well as Imam Saheb and Dasht-i-Archi
towns in neighbouring Kunduz province, on Sunday. Opposition fighters
later pulled out from parts of Khwajaghar under pressure from Taliban
fighters, AFP added. 

AFGHANISTAN: Taliban accuses Northern Alliance of ceasefire violations

Meanwhile, the Taliban movement's official Radio Shariat accused the
opposition of manipulating the 10-12 October ceasefire - agreed by the two
sides to facilitate the UN's countrywide polio immunisation campaign - by
attacking Taliban positions, according to news reports. The polio campaign
started in the opposition-held Badakhshan province on Sunday, and in the
northeastern Panjshir valley and Parwan province on Saturday. The UN's
anti-polio drive aims to protect 5.3 million children in Afghanistan,
where the crippling disease is endemic. 

UZBEKISTAN: Uzbek president softens stance on Taliban

In the wake of a meeting last week of a six-nation grouping of Central
Asian states, signatories of a Collective Security Agreement, to discuss
the situation in Afghanistan, President Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan has
softened his rhetoric regarding the Taliban movement. "The Taliban do not
represent a threat to Uzbekistan," news organisations quoted Karimov as
saying. He said the Taliban had controlled the nearest Afghan frontier
town to Uzbekistan for more than a year without any sign of aggression.

"We might not like them, but this force has become the dominating one and
we don't need any escalation, conflicts or wars," Karimov said. Uzbekistan
was in June accused of aiding the opposition Northern Alliance in
Afghanistan, when Uzbek jets were alleged to have violated Afghan airspace
near the border town of Hayraton. 

UZBEKISTAN: Afghan Uzbek ambassadors meet again

Meanwhile, the Afghan and Uzbek ambassadors to Pakistan met for the second
time on Saturday to discuss bilateral relations, the BBC reported on
Monday.  Afghan ambassador Mullah Salam Zaif told his Uzbek counterpart
that the Taliban wanted good neighbourly relations. The envoys discussed
trade relations and the opening up of the Hayraton Bander, a port on the
Uzbek-Afghan border, the report said. 

UZBEKISTAN: President slates idea of Eurasian Economic Community

President Karimov has criticised the plans of other Central Asian states
to establish a EurAsian Economic Community (EAEC) with Russia and Belarus,
Uzbek television reported on Friday. The EAEC would replace the former
Customs Union, a body aimed at achieving a free economic zone and
achieving closer coordination of customs policies, according to current
proposals. 

Speaking at a news conference in the Uzbek capital Tashkent on Thursday,
Karimov said the six-year-old Customs Union had not shown any substantial
results, and described the new body as "stillborn". The news conference
marked the first day of an official visit by Ukrainian President Leonid
Kuchma, who also expressed scepticism about the EAEC, labelling it a
"time-bomb" for the former Soviet states. 

PAKISTAN: Japan provides aid to drought victims. 

Japan is to provide a $4.5 million grant for Pakistani drought relief, the
Japan Economic Newswire reported on Thursday. The grant will be used to
purchase water supply, medical and livestock relief products, and vehicles
for relief activities in drought-hit areas of Sindh and Balochistan
provinces, the Japanese embassy stated in a press release. Despite
economic sanctions imposed by Japan after Pakistan conducted six nuclear
tests in May 1998, Japan has continued to be the largest humanitarian aid
donor to the country. 

TAJIKISTAN: Unemployment high and rising, says Labour Minister

Unemployment in Tajikistan continues to rise and its real level is not
reflected in official statistics, Labour and Employment Minister Rafiqa
Musoyeva said in the Tajik capital Dushanbe on Friday, Asia-Plus news
agency reported. The number of people in work had fallen by more than
260,000 in the last eight years alone, and unemployment had increased from
8,000 to 50,000 during that period, the report quoted Musoyeva as saying.
"The official unemployment level was three percent in the first nine
months of this year, but the figure does not reflect the real level of
unemployment,"  he said. 

"If we take into account the fact that over 222,000 people from the listed
number of employees do not receive salaries, then the hidden level of
unemployment will reach 16.3 percent by the end of 2000," Musoyeva said.
The working-age population of Tajikistan now stood at over three million
people, the report said. 

[ENDS]

[IRIN-Asia: Tel: +254 2 622147 Fax: +254 2 622129 e-mail: 
irin-cea@ocha.unon.org ]


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