AFGHAN SUPPORT GROUP MEETING TO BEGIN IN STOCKHOLM ON 21 JUNE

Press Release
AFG/96
PI/1147

AFGHAN SUPPORT GROUP MEETING TO BEGIN IN STOCKHOLM ON 21 JUNE

ISLAMABAD (UN Information Centre) -- Stephanie Bunker, the United Nations Spokesperson for Afghanistan, announced today at the weekly briefing that the Afghan Support Group would hold its first meeting for 1999 in Stockholm on 21 and 22 June. The Afghan Support Group usually meets in June and December in one of the main donor capitals, and gathers international supporters of the assistance community.

Ms. Bunker noted that Under Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Sergio Vieira de Mello, who has been assigned as the Acting Special representative in Kosovo, will be replaced at the Stockholm meeting by Carol Bellamy, Executive Director of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). Ms. Bellamy will address the group on "Humanitarian Perspectives in Afghanistan", while United Nations Special Envoy for Afghanistan Lakhdar Brahimi will make the first presentation on the ongoing peace process. The conference will also take stock of the current climate for assistance, common programming, funding, narcotics, refugee protection and human rights.

On a different topic, the Spokesperson voiced the concern of the United Nations about the forest fires that erupted in Kunar Province (Eastern Afghanistan) on 12 June. She said Kunar is one of the most important forested areas remaining in a heavily deforested country. Afghan authorities have appealed to the Government of Pakistan for materials and teams to fight the fire. The Office of the United Nations Coordinator for Afghanistan has also sent an urgent request to Geneva to determine the possibility and extent of the United Nations response to this environmental crisis.

On the subject of the recent anti-polio National Immunization campaign in Afghanistan, Ms. Bunker also announced that while final results are still being tallied -- UNICEF and World Health Organization (WHO) officials are optimistic that a higher percentage of children under five than ever before had received the vaccine. It was the first time in three years that supplies could be sent across the front lines into the Parwan and Kapisa provinces (Central Afghanistan).

Dozens of personnel from United Nations Agencies and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), as well as members of non-governmental organizations, civil society and local government took cases of vaccines for the first time to the front line by truck. From there, they were transported

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by donkey for a one-and-a-half hour journey to trucks on the other side. "This is an important step forward, as the surveillance system indicates that this region reports many of the country's new annual cases of the disease", added Ms. Bunker.

The 1999 campaign also marks the first time in 18 months that immunization against polio reached children in many parts of the northern region around Mazar-i-Sharif. Another immunization campaign will be held in October and November, in a continuing effort to help achieve the global goal of polio eradication by the end of the year 2000.

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