In this issue:

UNITED NATIONS IN KYRGYZSTAN

• Training for members of the UN Journalist Club

UNITED NATIONS DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME (UNDP)

• Preventive Development Programme: Sport and Culture do not Know Borders
• People from cross border areas of Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan get together to celebrate Nooruz

UNITED NATIONS IN KYRGYZSTAN

“We can do it now in our own offices!”:

Training for members of the UN Journalist Club took place at the UN House on 19 March 2004

It was the first one out of the series of training workshops planned for the year of 2004, which was announced by the Kyrgyz President “The Year of Social Mobilization and Good Governance”. Challenge of good governance is a top priority for Kyrgyzstan at present. That is why it was decided to provide key national journalists with the basic knowledge of what “good governance” means in practice, and how UNDP supports Kyrgyz Government on the way of optimization its structure and improvement of its effectiveness.

The training topic was “Functional Analysis of State Administration”. UNDP National Governance Programme staff: Suiunbek Syrdybaev, Nurjan Toktobaev and Asylbek Keshikbaev started with a general overview of functional analysis, which UNDP undertook in order to optimize structure of the state bodies, clarify their mission, goals, functions and activities and advise the ways for structural and functional optimization aimed at rising its effectiveness and transparency, which is to ensure the Kyrgyz citizens with provision of high quality services.

Journalists were given information on analysis undertaken by several Kyrgyz ministries, including Ministry of Health, Ministry of Environment and Emergency and Ministry of Education and Culture, as well as their branches in the provinces. Trainers also provided journalists with brief overview on reforms in the area of public administration in CIS and Western countries in order to compare the scope of work done in this area in Kyrgyzstan.

During the practical part of the training journalists divided into two groups made an express analysis in one of the Kyrgyz ministries.

“We can do it now in our own offices! - Said one of participants after the training. - It is particularly important to think over what exactly your particular organization does, why it exists and what your personal role is in development of its effectiveness.

Before the training, the phrase - “functional analysis” meant nothing for us. Now we’ll see more clearly how the recommendations, which were worked out during the analysis, could be implemented in practice. It gives the society a chance to get more effective and transparent system of governance in the nearest future. It will benefit all of us”.

It is planned that members of the UN Journalist Club and other national journalists should also be trained in the areas of social mobilization and micro crediting for poverty reduction, decentralization and self-governance development, preventive development, gender and environment during 2004.

For additional information, please contact Olga Grebennikova, UNDP Public Relations Officer. Tel.: (0 996 312) 61-12-13. Fax: (0 996 312) 61-12-17. Email:

UNITED NATIONS DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME (UNDP)

UNDP Preventive Development Programme: Sport and Culture do not Know Borders

Almost 5000 Participants from Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan celebrated together Nooruz with “Festivals of Friendship”

People of all nationalities in the border regions of the Ferghana Valley came together on March 19 in the Aksai-Voruch area (Kyrgyzstan) and on March 20 in the Gulchona-Kulundinsk area (Tajikistan) to celebrate jointly the Muslim New year “Nooruz” on multicultural Festivals. The event was organized in the framework of the Cross Border Project of the UNDP Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan conflict prevention programmes, who had not only managed to bring together thousands of dwellers but also the representatives of local and district governments and administrations, mass media, local department of ministry of interior, customs and border troops of both sides.

“Conflict prevention begins with talking to each other. There are not so much problems in our region now, because we are in a constant dialogue, and that is also thanks to the successful work UNDP is doing in this region”, said the Tajik representative of the local Department for Internal Affairs. People in the region connect with the initiatives of the cross border project between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan also the hope that it could be expanded to Uzbekistan.

“Of course we can not solve all the problems in the regions with these kind of festivals but sport and culture are things which are able to bridge over territorial borders”, said Abdiraim Jorokulov, Manager of the UNDP Preventive Development Programme in the South of Kyrgyzstan.

The situation in both cross border areas is characterized by a complicated borderline, cutting in pieces a territory that was structurally and ethnically interweaved during the seven decades of soviet rule. With 71 disputed landplots, ethnically mixed population, scarce natural resources, poverty and a largely divided infrastructure, the region showed its vulnerability to interethnic conflicts in the long list of past border incidences and clashes between ethnic groups.

To mediate in this situation UNDP uses the fact that it has field offices on both sides of the border so the cross border approach begins in UNDP itself through the establishment of a close relationship between the Kyrgyz offices in Jalal Abad, Osh, Batken and the Tajik UNDP Implementation Office in Khudjand.

The Festival was widely enriched and colored by the efforts and participation of local communities. While sports competitions like the “Marathon of Friendship” and “Kyrösh”, a tradition of wrestling shared by both nations.

All kind of traditional meals filled the air with the richness of aromas in the cuisine of the Ferghana Valley. Dances, songs, traditional costumes had their place in an accompanying cultural programme but were largely spontaneous rather than planned.

A Tajik girl, who was walking arm in arm with her Kyrgyz friend, told us that it enjoyed very much the Kyrgyz dance performance and wanted now to learn the dances too. For the young participants the festivals seemed to have nothing to do with “conflict prevention”, for them it was more a welcomed opportunity to plunge themselves into the multitude of life.

For additional information, please contact Olga Grebennikova, UNDP Public Relations Officer or Mia Rimby, UNDP Programme Officer. Tel.: (0 996 312) 61-12-13. Fax: (0 996 312) 61-12-17. Email: or

You could also visit UNDP Preventive Development website where a lot of information on the programme’s activities are available together with recently published Early Warning Report. Please go to: Preventive Development Programme

People from cross border areas of Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan get together to celebrate Nooruz

According to the tradition, the young people dressed in national costumes were meeting the guests from Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan coming to celebrate the festival of Nooruz at the entrance of the park in the Jalalabad district village of Alabuka. Among the 5000 guests were not only the inhabitants of the neighboring villages, but also the dwellers of the frontier line village of Kasansay, Namangan district of Uzbekistan.

A trade-exhibition of the handicrafts made by the local skilled craftsmen arranged in the park of the village spoke about the revival of the good-neighbor relations among the communities of two countries divided by the borders as well as of the unity and diversity of the cultures and the traditions kept in Uzbek and Kyrgyz families for ages, better than any promotional slogan.

The cauldrons cooking the traditional dish of “Sumolok” were steaming in the park. Different Volley-ball teams coming from the neighboring villages as well as from Uzbekistan were getting ready for the competition; and the creative troops from both of the countries were rehearsing their program of folk songs and dances.

On March 21, 2004, the Alabuka state regional administration together with the local government bodies of Kasansay region, Namangan district of the republic of Uzbekistan, with the support of the UNDP Preventive Development programme, organized the festival of Nooruz in the frontier-line-village of Alabuka, aiming at strengthening friendship and good-neighbor relations between the Uzbek and Kyrgyz nations by means of employing the methods of public diplomacy, art and sports, which, as everybody knows, have no borders.

Apart from the sportsmen, the amateur actors and skilled craftsmen, the festival was attended by the heads of the state administration and the delegates of the local committees from the border areas of Kasansay and Alabuka.

In their speech addressed to the guests of the festival, Mr. Nuraly Kurmantaev, Head of Alabuka (Kyrgyzstan), and Mr. Tursunkhon Akhmedov, Deputy head of Kasansay, (Uzbekistan), mentioned that organization of such activities contributes to strengthening the friendship as well as close collaboration between the two nations and leads to broadening the spheres of co-operation among the countries. Besides, the essence of the festival of Nooruz is purification and the rise of new life. Since the time immemorial, the Central Asian nations have been meeting the New Year on the day of vernal equinox enjoying awakening of nature, forgetting offences and hoping for the lucky year.

When people were enjoying different types of sport competitions and contests for the best song, dance and national costume and the public was applauding the actors and awarding them the prizes of the audience sympathy, the heads of the cross border regions were discussing the ways of co-operation. The heads of Alabuka and Kasansay were discussing the problems leading to increasing social tension in the frontier-line-villages, including the issues of cross border trade and the actions taken by the border and customs services in cases of crossing the border. The meeting participants came to the common conclusion that regular dialogues between the heads of the regions of Alabuka and Kasansay about the existing problems are essential.

Based on common understanding that these are the most effective ways of strengthening international relations and good-neighborliness as well as the effective tools of bringing the cultures of two brother nations together, the agreement was made about organizing the same kind of activities in the future as well.

For additional information, please contact Olga Grebennikova, UNDP Public Relations Officer or Mia Rimby, UNDP Programme Officer. Tel.: (0 996 312) 61-12-13. Fax: (0 996 312) 61-12-17. Email: or

You could also visit UNDP Preventive Development website where a lot of information on the programme’s activities are available together with recently published Early Warning Report. Please go to: Preventive Development Programme