DR. TAHIR MIR, WHO MEDICAL OFFICER, POLIO ERADICATION INITIATIVE

Although we are passing through a very sad moment just one week before this Peace Day when this incident happened in Spin Boldak I would still like to share with you some good news about polio eradication.

A clear manifestation of the efforts of thousands of vaccinators and health workers in Afghanistan is now in front of us. It can now be clearly and loudly told. There is no evidence of polio virus transmission in all areas in Afghanistan which have been safely accessed by polio vaccinators. Only areas which are inaccessible to our teams due to insecurity have reported polio cases. To date, the country reports 18 polio cases, of which 16 out of 18 are reported from the southern part while the remaining two are from the eastern regions.
           
It is rather important to note the polio virus is localized in the southern part which is critical to protect other children elsewhere in the country and the neighbouring polio-free countries.

In a recent review global experts concur that among the remaining polio endemic countries in the world (Nigeria, India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan) that among these four Afghanistan can do it first of reaching the goal of a “polio-free Afghanistan.” Together the government, UN agencies and health partners work hand-in-hand with communities to maintain strong commitment of making polio a part of Afghanistan’s history.

This is good news but the programme is facing challenges. The big challenge over the last years the non-accessible areas in the southern parts of Afghanistan continue to report polio cases. Continued insecurity has greatly challenged our vaccination efforts. Efforts are in place to immunise children in the areas but because of insecurity we are unable to access more than 100,000 children in each vaccination round campaign in the southern part.

In addition, we are working very closely with the neighbouring countries to address the issue of very high population movement of these countries across the border. Unfortunately the polio virus doesn’t respect borders. There is a lot of extra vigilant efforts going on to cover these border crossing populations. Permanent vaccination teams at 14 cross border points are vaccinating where every day more than 2500 children daily are being vaccinated.

The Government’s commitment is to eradicate polio by 2009. Pulling off this goal can only be realised with access to areas which polio vaccinators have not set foot in recent years.  We will continue to work with the Government and health partners until such time that no single child in this country has been missed out.

WHO, UNICEF and Ministry of Public Health and other partners are not suspending any polio campaign activities in the southern part following the recent incident in Spin Boldak. The attack is indeed beyond our comprehension and we are deeply saddened by the tragic death of our colleagues.

The polio eradication mission will continue in the southern part and immunization campaigns will be carried out as scheduled in all of Afghanistan. This is probably the best way to honour our colleagues.

UNICEF REPRESENTATIVE IN AFGHANISTAN, MS. CATHERINE MBNEGUE

This year, the Peace Polio National Immunization Days will take place between 21 - 23 September.

Last year, on the occasion of the Peace Day celebration we saw incredible commitments from all parties to the conflict. Over 10,000 vaccinators were able to go to insecure areas and managed to vaccinate over 1.3 children under five years old. What took place last year is what we want to see this year.

Peace Days provide us with an extremely important opportunity to reach all children who need to be vaccinated against polio during our campaigns. Many districts in the southern and eastern parts of Afghanistan have again been missed this year during our polio campaigns due to insecurity, attacks, abduction and other violence. As a result polio transmission continues to circulate in Afghanistan. 

On 21 September the Peace Polio immunization campaign aims to vaccinate 1.8 million children who are under five.

WHO and UNICEF encourage all parties to understand that immunisation is a life saving activity for the children and is not for any political agenda.

I would also like to take this opportunity to talk about the protection of schools and literacy centres in Afghanistan

The education programme has managed to bring over six million children into schools. The UN joint programme on literacy is serving over 120,000 people in Afghanistan. These are programmes which are key to empowering every Afghan child and every Afghan family towards peace building in this country that has suffered more than 30 years of war.

On the occasion of 21 September Peace Day UNICEF and UNESCO are again asking all parties to recognise and respect the fact that children, teachers at schools and literacy centres in Afghanistan should be protected against all kinds of violence.

UNESCO REPRESENTATIVE IN AFGHANISTAN, MR. SHIGERU AOYAGI

Let me begin with my key message on the occasion of Peace Day from UNESCO.

Education promotes peace and vice versa peace promotes education. But today in Afghanistan education is at risk.

More than 230 students and teachers were killed and around 250 schools were attacked by militants during the past three years. The worsening security situation in the southern and western parts of the country is keeping almost 70 per cent of school-age children away from schools. 

Throughout the country 88 attacks on schools were carried out during the last six months and 640 schools are closed at present.

Another very sad and unfortunate incident that we heard is about a women literacy teacher who was killed along with her husband and two children in the early morning on 16 September (just two days ago) by anti-government elements in her village in Hakimabad in Kunar Province. We do not yet know the circumstances leading to the incident or the reason why she was targeted. It appears that she had received warning earlier and threat letters before asking her to stop teaching at the literacy centre.

These threatening conditions are making it difficult for the students to carry on their studies in a peaceful and tranquil atmosphere which needs to be addressed more seriously.

According to the National School Survey, more than 6 million children and youth were enrolled in schools in 2007 in Afghanistan; among them 2.1 million are girls. Despite significant progress half of the school-age children are estimated to be out of school with great gender and provincial disparities and there are at least 11 million Afghans age 15 and above who are illiterate. In rural areas where 74 per cent of all Afghans live, an estimated 90 per cent of women and 63 per cent of men cannot read and write.

UNESCO’s mission, together with other UN agencies including UNICEF and WHO and development partners, is to promote education as a fundamental human right and to improve the quality of education. “Education for All”, “United Nations Literacy Decade” as well as the “UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development” which UNESCO is assigned as the lead coordinator are some of the UN response to address the importance of education. Education is a fundamental human right as well as a means to promote peace and democracy.
 
This basic human right is still being denied to a lot of children, youth and adults in Afghanistan due to insufficient resources and insecurity. To address the huge challenge, UNESCO has recently launched jointly with the Ministry of Education a massive literacy programme called “Enhancement of Literacy in Afghanistan” to bring literacy learning to 600,000 illiterate youths and adults in 18 provinces in the coming five years with financial support from Japan.

Protecting schools, literacy centres, students and teachers is indispensable to guarantee learning opportunities for all Afghans and have sustainable impact on communities. We should take the opportunity of the Peace Day to promote debate and raise awareness against attacks on education among people and communities across Afghanistan in order to prevent and reduce such attacks.

UNICEF REPRESENTATIVE IN AFGHANISTAN, MS. CATHERINE MBNEGUE

In a few days we are celebrating 21 September Peace Day. We have a message UNESCO UNICEF and WHO are urging all parties and all communities to take the opportunity of 21 September to renew their commitment and respect for all Afghan people especially for children’s rights to life and education away from politics and conflict.

We hope you can carry this message in all the corners of Afghanistan.

KILLID RADIO [translated from Dari]: There have been some reports in the media following the recent [suicide attack on a UN convoy] incident in Kandahar that WHO has cancelled the polio campaign in the South of the country. Please tell us about it. And the second question: all schools that closed in the Qarabagh district of Ghazni province are now functioning, but on the basis of children paying on their own. This is what the Taliban has told them to do and teachers should not receive anything from the Government. Does this kind of education satisfy you?

WHO:  It’s true that with this recent incident the whole situation was gloomy and all were watching very carefully how things moving. It is probably important to share with you the exact quotes of the team there. You should know the whole story of the determination of that the team. They sat together in Kandahar and decided that they would not be defeated and will carry forward the mission of our colleagues, for which they gave their lives. Polio eradication, whatever the security situation, will go on over there. We will go on and carry out all the activities as planned.

UNICEF: Education is a public good and what we know is that education is free in Afghanistan. And as we say, we believe that children have a right to education and education should stay away from any form of politics and conflict.

UNESCO: I think that your question is very relevant to Peace Day. Education is very weak and a soft sector during such circumstances in the country. This vulnerable education sector should be supported by the government and community, otherwise again the education will be at risk. As you know, recently Education Minister Hanif Atmar decided to increase the salary of teachers. This is a good sign from the government side but at the same time we have to mobilise people to recognise education as a means of creating peace, democracy and bringing development. So in that sense I really ask you to send a message to the people in Afghanistan "education promotes peace, peace promotes education".

XINHUA:  I want to know If WHO and UNICEF have approached the Taliban to allow polio vaccinators to carry out their campaign in areas where militants are active?

UNAMA [translated from Pashto]: This call for peace is for everyone and we have urged everyone, and asked the question what are you doing for peace? So it is everyone's responsibility to do something on Peace Day through the call conveyed through the media.

FREELANCE JOURNALIST: A follow up on the talks with the Taliban. Last year through the communities you successfully negotiated safe passage in insecure areas. We understood from the movie on peace day that the emirate of Taliban had issued a letter guaranteeing safe passage. Could you shed some light on how talks through communities are going forward [this year]? Because it seems to be more difficult this year. And also about areas you cannot access: have they increased this year and by how much?

UNICEF: We call for days of tranquillity, as we do every time we have a round of campaign. And we do that by calling on all parties and we do that through calling to everybody in the community, which I hope give us opportunity to have safe access so that we can reach each and every single child who needs to be vaccinated in this country. And the peace day celebration this year is again for us an opportunity to do the same.

IRNA: [translated from Dari]: You said that 11 million people can not read and write in the rural areas. I would like to know on what basis you made this estimate because the situation of statistics in Afghanistan is not clear yet. International sources are giving the figure of 25 million [for the total population size] while national sources give 30 million as the figure for the population.
 
UNESCO: This was figure was articulated in Afghanistan’s millennium development goals. And you are right this figure is not exact. That is why UNESCO has begun to support the ministry of education in establishing stronger statistical data. And now we have more reliable numbers and figures regarding education.

AFGHANISTAN TIMES [translated from Pashto]: You mentioned some inaccessible areas into which vaccination teams could not go. Can you specify the names of those areas in southern or any other parts of the country? And the second part of my question is how many children have not received polio vaccination in Afghanistan?

WHO: As far as these inaccessible areas are concerned, they are mostly localities in the southern region. They fluctuate…but the main districts are Musa Qala, Nawzad and Nadiali for much of the time, and then Maiwand. Most of the time we face a constant situation of not having good access in these five to six districts but the situation keeps changing. Sometimes it is Shah Wali Kot or other districts, so it keeps changing.  Overall, the estimated number of children being missed is more than 100,000 children below five years in age.  That gives you an indication of the number of children among which the polio virus may continue to circulate. We need to reach every child every time during the campaign to have successful eradication. If we are missing any pool of children then the virus will keep circulating. 

The event I was mentioning earlier [the attack on the UN convoy] is leading to an environment of fear among the people and staff that monitor the campaign and the vaccinators who give the vaccinations to the children. Because the requirement is that they go house-to-house and try to find all children under five and vaccinate them. But this environment of fear is not allowing them, discouraging them to be in the field. And that’s the reason, as Catherine mentioned, why we keep on requesting and reminding everyone that the programme needs days of tranquillity. When we say days of tranquillity that means all parties to the conflict agreeing on certain days of the campaign where no conflict will happen. And then these days will be only for the children of Afghanistan and to save them from this disease. And this is all we are looking for – we need support from all the partners.

UNICEF: We are confident that we have technically all the ingredients to eradicate polio in Afghanistan. What we need is days of tranquillity. Every two months roughly we have to access these 100.000 children in Afghanistan with polio vaccination. If we have the days of tranquillity we are confident we can finish the job of eradication of polio in Afghanistan. It is within reach.

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