Help needed to deal with aftermath of disasters

Kyrgyzstan’s emergency agency needs assistance to deal with the aftermath of natural disasters that hit the south of the former Soviet republic in one of the harshest winters in the past 20 years, an emergency spokesman said on Thursday. “We have appealed to many organisations and embassies of various countries for assistance to deal with the consequences of heavy snow and avalanches that struck the south in late January,” Abibilla Pazylov of the Kyrgyz emergencies ministry said from the capital, Bishkek. “In some areas, like the Kara-Kulja district of the southern Osh province, the snow cover was two metres and it was one of the most heavily affected areas,” the emergency official maintained. According to the Kyrgyz emergencies ministry, the total amount of damage incurred was estimated to be worth more than US $2 million. “More than 2,000 homes and administrative buildings have been completely destroyed or damaged and four people were killed,” Pazylov added. Earlier this week, the Ukranian government pledged to provide assistance to Bishkek to deal with damage and destruction caused by the winter’s disasters. “According to Ukraine’s embassy in Kyrgyzstan, the Ukrainian government has approved a decree to provide humanitarian aid to Kyrgyzstan,” Pazylov said, adding, however, that the amount and type of assistance were not known yet. Some international organisations and donor countries, including the US-based Counterpart Consortium NGO, Spain’s defence ministry, and the Russian and German governments, have provided some in-kind assistance already. The Central Asian region, including Kyrgyzstan, is prone to various natural disasters, including earthquakes, landslides, floods, avalanches and drought. According to the European Commission Humanitarian Aid department (ECHO), natural disasters have killed about 2,500 people and affected some 5.5 million, almost 10 percent of the total population in the region, over the past decade.