By empty (5/18/2002 issue of the CACI Analyst)
A donors meeting in Geneva is said to have produced informal pledges worth tens of millions of dollars towards reconstructing Afghanistan\'s security services - enough, the UN says, to make a start on a number of security-related projects. The meeting, attended by around 35 donor countries, the UN\'s special representative for Afghanistan, Lakhdar Brahimi, and Afghanistan\'s Interim Foreign Minister, Abdullah Abdullah, was aimed at firming up offers of assistance to help Afghanistan rebuild its army, police force and other security services. Mr Brahimi, refused to reveal figures, pointing out that offers and commitments had been made verbally and in a piecemeal fashion.By empty (5/18/2002 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Former Pavlodar Oblast Governor Ghalymzhan Zhaqiyanov, one of the leading members of the opposition movement Democratic Choice for Kazakhstan, was hospitalized early on 18 May in Pavlodar after losing consciousness after a 12-hour interrogation. Doctors had advised earlier in the interrogation that Zhaqiyanov urgently required medical treatment for heart problems; his condition is said to be \"critical.\" Zhaqiyanov, who turned 39 on 8 May, was taken by force from Almaty, where he was under house arrest, to Pavlodar last month.By empty (5/18/2002 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Thousands of picketers blocked one of the main highways in Kyrgyzstan on Saturday in the sixth day of protests that have set the Central Asian country on edge. The ministry estimated the number of picketers at about 2,000 but opposition members said there were as many as 8,000 and that they were ready to march to the capital. Protests throughout the country over the past week have called for President Askar Akayev to resign and for the government to drop charges against lawmaker Azimbek Beknazarov.By empty (5/18/2002 issue of the CACI Analyst)
Some 150 families of displaced persons from Abkhazia took refuge on 16 May in the Institute of Geology in Tbilisi. Municipal authorities cut electricity and water supplies to the building, but the displaced persons have locked themselves in and refuse to vacate the premises, claiming they have nowhere else to live. Two months ago, police forcibly evicted some 150 displaced persons who had occupied Tbilisi\'s Botanical Institute.The Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst is a biweekly publication of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Program, a Joint Transatlantic Research and Policy Center affiliated with the American Foreign Policy Council, Washington DC., and the Institute for Security and Development Policy, Stockholm. For 15 years, the Analyst has brought cutting edge analysis of the region geared toward a practitioner audience.
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