PRESS BRIEFING BY THE U.N. OFFICES FOR PAKISTAN AND AFGHANISTAN (15 January 2002)

The following is a near-verbatim transcript of today’s briefing at the United Nations Information Center in Islamabad by the United Nations offices for Pakistanand Afghanistan (excluding question and answer session).

** Eric Falt, Director, UN Information Centre

Good afternoon. United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan will be traveling to Tokyo this weekend to attend the International Conference on Reconstruction Assistance to Afghanistan.

The two-day Conference, co-chaired by Japan, the United States, the European Union and Saudi Arabia, is scheduled to take place on 21 and 22 January. Around 50 countries with an interest in the reconstruction of Afghanistan are expected to send high-level representatives. The UN, but also other international organizations will have senior representation too.

The stated objective is to send a message that a broad range of countries from North America, Europe, Asia and Islamic countries are truly committed to contributing to the reconstruction of Afghanistan and supporting peace and stability. To that effect, a comprehensive needs assessment is being formulated by the UNDP, the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank.

This meeting is very much needed at a time when there is very little cash in the coffers of the Afghan Interim Administration. In Kabul, yesterday, Mr. Brahimi appealed to donors through his spokesman to respond quickly to a nearly $100 million appeal in support of the Interim Administration. They need to give salaries to their employees, who have not been paid for the past six months and salaries are also needed for the next six months.

Despite some pledges, very little has come through so far, and it is now time for the international community to start delivering on its promises. In the Start-Up Fund established following talks in Bonn last month and which sought first $20 million, then another $ 70 million, it is telling to underline that some $17 million were pledged but only $3 million were effectively received.

In this context, it is also important to mention here that the Special Representative attended the inauguration of the Pakistan Embassy in Kabul yesterday, where a senior official of the Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs Mr. Sultan Ayub Khan announced a contribution of $100 million towards the reconstruction of Afghanistan. Mr. Brahimi said he was delighted to see that Pakistan was “resuming business in Afghanistan”. He underlined that the peoples of the two nations were brothers and neighbors, and shared a common culture and a common future. He said he looked forward to Pakistan playing its role among the growing diplomatic community in Kabul and helping Afghanistan, which had suffered the ills of war and destruction, turn a new page in their history, one of progress, reconstruction and peace.

** Stephanie Bunker, Spokesperson for the Office of the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Afghanistan

In the north, the situation has noticeably improved over the last week with a reduction of armed forces in the city of Mazar and the regularization of forces within the city. Access to some rural areas, such as Faryab province, has started to become possible due to improvements in security.

There is still lack of clarity on numbers of displaced persons in the north, and it is believed that numbers of displaced persons are being represented in some areas by local people trying to manipulate aid. It has been agreed among aid agencies that further assistance in some areas should await a more measured assessment of the situation and re-surveying as necessary.

Contrary to some press reports, the IDP population situated north of the Amu Darya has, in the main, not returned to their homes. Uncertain security in Imam Sahib, Kunduz Province, appears to be a factor, and to date international agency activities there have been limited. Agencies currently working with this population have expressed their willingness to assist their return once they elect to move, but large-scale movements are not expected until after the Afghan New Year in late March. Until then, agencies will continue to require free access from Tajikistan.

The majority of the 18,000 IDP families in the northeast have now returned to their areas of origin. Because they have had their areas of origin systematically burnt twice (in 1999 and in 2001), because agriculture has been badly affected by the drought and because they have been displaced for up to two years in places, they are highly vulnerable. NGOs are in the process of completing a multi-agency damage assessment of housing in north Takhar and northeast Kunduz. Initial estimates were that at least 10,000 houses were destroyed or badly damaged as a result of Taleban occupation or conflict.

In Hazarajat, the first UN plane since 1998 landed at Bamyan City. It is hoped to resume regular flights to Bamyan in due course. While snow has begun falling, teams are on standby in Hazarajat to clear all strategic passes, should they be blocked, to maintain access routes all through winter. This has allowed food deliveries to continue to Yakowlang and Balkhab. A priority has been to secure access through winter to Chagcharan in Ghor from Herat. A Swedish team is working with WFP to try to ensure the road remains open.

In southern Afghanistan, the regional coordinator for southern region returned to Kandahar City on 13 January. The situation remains unstable, with a significant number of Taliban still armed and present around the city, but it is slowly returning to normal.

A disarmament plan by local authorities is apparently now underway. The recent UN security assessment, however, has indicated it may be some time before conditions allow the full return of international staff. A ceiling of 14 exists for the number of international staff.

Access between Pakistan and Kandahar City is possible, though security is still not guaranteed west of Kandahar and in many rural areas. Considerable losses have been experienced by UN and NGO agencies during the course of the recent conflict, including the WFP warehouse, which was completely destroyed along with many vehicles. All other offices have lost assets to
varying degrees. Some assets have been returned to the UN, including vehicles. Local authorities are supportive of the assistance community in the south and welcome the return of international staff.

The aid community in the south will shortly conduct a rapid assessment of the most vulnerable IDPs in southern Afghanistan. This is the fourth re- validation of the most vulnerable IDPs in southern Afghanistan since the beginning of the drought in late 1999.

This assessment is to be conducted by the end of January 2002 and will be crucial for future emergency relief operations.

Humanitarian activities are presently being resumed in areas where security permits. The provision of assistance to IDPs has been resumed, including in difficult areas such as Helmand, and large quantities of non-food items are being shipped into the region at present.

Preliminary surveys have revealed that cluster bombs and new mines have been detected in areas surrounding Kandahar airport, Arghandab and Panjwai district.

** Wagdi Othman, Spokesperson for WFP

Good Afternoon. With winter setting in, the amount of snow and rainfall is making food deliveries more difficult to some parts of Afghanistan, especially in the north.

In Faizabad, it has been snowing and raining almost non-stop day and night for the last couples of days. It is anticipated that snow will start accumulating on the road between Faizabad and Iskashem, a vital route for WFP food aid deliveries from Tajikistan to Faizabad.

WFP snow clearance team is working on the road to keep it open. To do this, they have converted a truck in to a snowplough using locally available material. The team has also enlisted the help of the local population in clearing snow from known trouble spots In Zarah district, south of Mazar-I-Sharif, WFP has now hired 300 donkeys to deliver food to remote villages in that area including Bonawash where recent efforts were stepped up due to the poor conditions of the villagers. Due to the insufficient number of trucks available in the province, we are also bringing to Mazar from Turkmenistan, 14 four-wheel drive trucks to help with the deliveries.

WFP food distributions are continuing in Zarah district. Furthermore, WFP is preparing a distribution in the neighboring Kishendeh district where about 41,000 people will receive food rations. In western Afghanistan, WFP partners are distributing daily 90 metric tons of food to displaced people in the Maslakh camp, near Hirat. One of our sister agencies (IOM) has also started distributing blankets, clothing and firewood to the IDPs to help them cope with the harsh winter conditions.

Food distributions are also continuing in Baghdis province in the central highlands. More than half of the 7,500 metric tons of food dispatched there has been distributed. A WFP 4 member team visited the province from 2 to 11 January. They have surveyed 18 villages and find out that the population’s main concern is access to clean water and the lack of humanitarian supplies other than food.

** Chulho Hyun, Spokesperson for UNICEF

Good afternoon. The head of the UNICEF office in Kandahar, Afghanistan, an international staff member, is now back in Kandahar for the first time since last September. He, along with other UN staff members, traveled there on the 14th of January via the Chaman-Spin Boldak Road. We expect to receive more details in the coming days about the office and current UNICEF activities in the Southern Region.

There is, though, one related update to share with you today, from recent discussions between UNICEF staff in Kandahar and the director of the provincial education department. We have learned that local authorities have reopened 89 schools for girls and boys in the past three week. Some 120,000 students have been registered, and 600 teachers (both female and male) have been recruited so far. The director is quoted as saying that the demand for education in Kandahar is so high that this reopening, registration and recruitment will continue.

UNICEF is committed to keep on doing all it can for the return back to the classroom by these students and teachers. We will continue working with authorities and our partners to deliver educational supplies and learning materials, assist in the training of teachers, and support the renovation of facilities. This is the case in Kandahar and across Afghanistan where, come this March 21st, an estimated 1.5 million children are expected to want to go to school.

** Yusuf Hassan, Spokesperson for UNHCR

A senior UNHCR official is visiting the Chaman border post to raise the question of the thousands of Afghans who have been camping out in the open for the last two weeks with the border authorities. Today, he was expected to meet the commander of the frontier corps and districts officials.

We are urging the authorities to give us the go ahead to move the vulnerable refugees into the new camps in Baluchistan.

The number of people in the waiting area in Chaman stands at 13,000. Some 92 per cent of them are Pashtuns from Kandahar, Zabul, Ghazni and Helmand. The rest are Tajiks, Balochs and other minorities. Among them are people from as far as Faryab and Badghis in north west Afghanistan. The overwhelming majority have left their homes and come to Pakistan for the first time ever.

The refugees have been forced to flee their homeland by a series of negative factors such as drought, hunger and conflict. Many of them have been hard hit by the three-year long drought, which has decimated their livestocks. The peasants among them have not been able to plant any corps for years and have been dependent on food aid. Others say they have been uprooted by the increasing lawlessness. Others say they have been made homeless by the recent air strikes.

** Lori Hieber-Girardet, Spokesperson for WHO

A World Health Organization team of essential drugs specialists has arrived in Kabul to begin work on re-establishing a drugs supply system in Afghanistan. They will carry out a first assessment- the team will be followed by later missions.

Afghanistan currently has no system in place to control the quality of drugs available in the country. The aim of the WHO mission is to help the Ministry of Health develop the capacity to undertake random testing to ward

against potentially harmful medicines, such as unsuitable, expired or fake drugs.

Afghanistan imports it drugs from neighboring countries, including Pakistan and Iran, or further abroad, often through private trading without proper oversight. Although there are quality drugs available, there is no way of knowing whether medicine bought
privately is reliable.

Making sure the population has access to appropriate drugs depends on the ability of the government to regulate medical supplies. The WHO team will support health officials set up a standardized system to monitor drug consumption and shipments to avoid shortages. This standardization should allow proper planning which will take into account seasonal diseases, such as malaria or recurrent diseases such as tuberculosis.

Another concern is to standardize treatment protocols. This means ensuring that doctors treat patients for the same diseases in a similar manner all over the country. This will entail training of local doctors and ensuring the required drugs are available, even in
remote areas.