Full Coverage: South West Asia

30.09.2005 The Bush administration's turnaround towards negotiating with North Korea has resulted in a preliminary nuclear framework agreement, and gives hope that the U.S. could apply similar concessions to Iran to stanch its nuclear program, says national security specialist Lee Feinstein.

29.09.2005 Opium production must be made legal in Afghanistan to end the country's heroin addiction crisis and bolster its economy, says an international drug policy think-tank.

28.09.2005 Accurate information about family planning and reproductive health issues is difficult to come by in Afghanistan--for journalists as well as the general public. A 5-day workshop for radio, TV, and print journalists in Kabul earlier this month aimed to begin to change that.

26.09.2005 The Uzbek government refuses to acknowledge the achievement of 10 local women nominated for the Nobel Prize under an international campaign to raise awareness of women working for peace around the world and has been accused of persecuting them.

23.09.2005 UNITED NATIONS, Sep 22 (IPS) - At the height of the Cold War in the 1950s and 1960s, the United States and the former Soviet Union jealously safeguarded their own global political and military interests by vetoing each other's resolutions in the most powerful body at the United Nations: the Security Council.

23.09.2005 On September 8, 2005, the EU/UNDP funded project “Enhancement of Living Standards in Karakalpakstan” organized a roundtable on micro financing and community participation.

21.09.2005 The "stunning use of excessive force" by Uzbek authorities - and the subsequent government cover-up - to crush a protest in Andijan in May is documented in two new reports by human rights groups.

20.09.2005 Afghanistan’s parliamentary and provincial council elections escaped large-scale violence, but voter turn-out was unexpectedly low, raising concerns about the elections’ ability to promote stability.

19.09.2005 Afghanistan's elections passed quietly Sunday with only isolated incidents of violence, but voters faced the daunting task of picking their chosen candidate out of 400 on the ballot, as well as an unfamiliar and complex voting process.

19.09.2005 Afghanistan has had its first taste of real elections, but to build a legitimate state that is strong enough to survive and competent enough to deliver results, the U.S. and its allies must continue to give their political and economic support, says J. Alexander Thier, director of Stanford University's Project on Failed States.

16.09.2005 Some candidates are struck off the ballot sheet for technical infractions, while others with alleged links to violence remain in the running.

16.09.2005 Establishing a parliament is a key step on the road to a stable democracy, but Afghanistan's citizens and candidates have faced serious hurdles throughout the electoral process that will culminate in this weekend's elections, explains Institute for War and Peace Reporting journalists across the country.

15.09.2005 Amid an upswing in violence in Afghanistan ahead of parliamentary elections, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime has reported encouraging news on the Afghan government’s efforts to curb narcotics production.

15.09.2005 Mukhumd, one of more than 1,000 Uzbeks who sought asylum in neighboring Kyrgyzstan after the May 13 Andijan massacre, describes the Uzbek secret service agents who have traveled across the border to pursue him. “He shudders at every knock on the door of the house of his relatives--where he stays.”

13.09.2005 With Afghanistan's first-ever parliamentary elections next week, many regular Afghans want the government to provide security at polling centers and withdraw candidates who are known war criminals, shows a survey by CARE.

12.09.2005 The start of election campaigning has reignited the controversy over how independent the country’s new public service television station is.

12.09.2005 Internews, a U.S.-based media training NGO, has been ordered to close its office in Uzbekistan following months of harrassment by the Uzbek government, which has been cracking down on foreign non-governmental organizations.

12.09.2005 The stories of Afghan women leaders in education, child protection, health, cultural preservation, and community service are being featured in a calendar to be used in classrooms to encourage girls to see women as role models in Afghanistan, a country where severe gender inequality exists.

09.09.2005 The U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime reports an anticipated 21 percent drop in poppy cultivation in Afghanistan this year, due mainly to tougher law enforcement and a large-scale eradication campaign. For the decline to persist, however, the policy must stay the course, the report added.

07.09.2005 Afghanistan's ministry of women’s affairs announced on Tuesday that it was planning to build accommodation for at least one million vulnerable Afghan women in the city. The government signed an agreement with a German construction company to launch the countrywide project.