Consolidated Appeal launched

The United Nations launched its Consolidated Appeal (CA) for Tajikistan on Tuesday for humanitarian assistance in 2003. Land-locked Tajikistan is the poorest of the former Soviet republics and continues to face a precarious and complex humanitarian situation. "The population here remains very vulnerable due to the country's susceptibility to natural disasters as well as the legacy of the recent [1992-97] civil war," Valentin Gatzinski, head of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Tajikistan, told IRIN from the capital Dushanbe. Along with appeals for many other countries and regions ravaged by conflict, the Tajikistan request was launched in Bern, Switzerland by United Nations Deputy Secretary General. Similar appeals were also launched in New York, the Hague, Washington, Brussels and Luxembourg. Gatzinski pointed out that more than a million Tajiks had been affected by the drought of 2000-2001 - the worst to blight the country in 75 years. The Tajikistan 2003 CA seeks just over US $62 million to respond to needs in the water and sanitation, food security, education, child protection and emergency preparedness sectors. "This country enjoys a high degree of donor confidence, this year's CA is almost 87 percent funded. This shows clearly that money put into Tajikistan is well spent with measurable improvements in many sectors," Gatzinski said. But with unemployment at around 30 percent and monthly salaries just US $10, greater assistance is needed, says the humanitarian community. "So far there has been relatively little aid other than humanitarian. What we now need in conditions of peace and security in the country is investment in sustainable livelihoods and that is mainly in agriculture," Mathew Kahane, UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Tajikistan told IRIN. Despite these and other development challenges, Tajikistan has been an important regional player in tackling the humanitarian crisis in neighbouring Afghanistan. This Central Asian state of 6.5 million has been used as a base for coalition forces in the war against the Taliban and Al-qaeda as well as an important conduit for overland aid to northern Afghanistan. The humanitarian community in Tajikistan is concerned though, that the huge international donor interest in Afghanistan should not eclipse the very real needs in neighbouring countries. "There is a danger of there not being sufficient levels of assistance coming here to a country, where one can live and work in a straightforward fashion and which can therefore absorb quite a lot of development and humanitarian assistance," Kahane added. The other countries and regions for which the humanitarian community appealed for support on Tuesday included Angola, Burundi, Chechnya and neighbouring republics of the Russian Federation, Cote d'Ivoire and the West African sub-region, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, the Great Lakes Region, Guinea, Indonesia, Liberia, the occupied Palestinian Territory, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, and Uganda. The theme of the 2003 Consolidated Appeals, "Hope for the Future," emphasises the importance of providing hope to communities ravaged by conflict and other crises. It also addresses the need to support countries just emerging from crisis or conflict such as Afghanistan and Sierra Leone.