Capital's water supply still critical following floods and landslides

Tajikistan is starting to recover from torrential rains, heavy winds and landslides that battered much of the country last week. The most serious humanitarian consequence of the storm is that the capital's water supply remains heavily polluted, leaving an estimated 400,000 people without clean water and susceptible to disease. "The largest concern now is the water supply in Dushanbe because the risk of waterborne diseases is acute," Johannes Chudoba, United Nations Development Programme's strategic planning adviser, told IRIN from the Tajik capital. Despite a concerted effort by civic authorities to warn the capital's population not to drink the dirty water, the UNDP official asserted that "ultimately most people will [drink it]". "It will be at least several weeks before the turbidity of piped water is low enough for effective chlorination," Chudoba added, noting that the international community is helping the city to supplement the supply of drinking water with trucks. But water delivery by truck remains difficult because flooding has damaged several bridges and roads, including 26 km of road destroyed in the Varzob district, north of Dushanbe. "All of us consider the situation to be quite serious and we are concerned about local capacity to supply clean drinking water and also the capacity of medical structures," Cecile Pichon, representative of the European Commission Humanitarian Office (ECHO), told IRIN from Dushanbe, while noting a high level of coordination between humanitarian agencies and the Tajik authorities. While the UN children's agency UNICEF has been supplying chlorine and helping to enhance hospitals' response capacity, the Red Crescent Society of Tajikistan (RCST) has set up emergency medical facilities staffed by volunteers in the affected area of the capital. These centres will try to cope with the inevitable health problems that are emerging as many people have no choice but to drink contaminated water. Some people injured in the floods and landslides just north of the capital have had to walk up to 30 km to seek medical help because of impassable roads. According to UNDP, one person was reported killed in the village of Mujikharf in Nurobod district, about 100 km east of the capital, while 200 livestock were killed and two bridges and eight kilometres of road have been destroyed in the same area. Khorog's airport, in the southeast of the country, has been temporarily closed and the roofs of public and private buildings, along with electricity and communication lines, were damaged by heavy winds on 13 July. UNDP sources reported that 18 houses in Khorog city and Shugnan district were seriously damaged by floods on 12 July, which also destroyed a section of the road between Dushanbe and Khorog in the Saghirdasht area. In Kairokum town, Soghd district, mudslides on 14 July killed livestock and destroyed 40 houses. Up to 500 metres of the town's sewerage system has been damaged and wells are filled with mud and stones. Heavy rains and floods have also inflicted serious damage on the Soghd region's economy. About 105 hectares of cotton, grain and rice fields were flooded. Many cattle were killed in Spitamen District. The economic consequences for the mountainous country, the poorest of the Central Asian states, are expected to be very high. "The overall impact on the economy is severe, with harvests affected and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) suffering from being cut off from supplies and markets," the UNDP official said. To view maps of the devastation go to: www.irinnews.org/images/pdf/19Jly2004IAmtgFLOODS1.pdf www.irinnews.org/images/pdf/19Jly2004IAmtgFLOODS2.pdf