Putin Pledges More Fuel For Tajikistan Emergency
By Michael Heath
Bloomberg
MOSCOW — Russian President Vladimir Putin pledged to help Tajikistan battle what the Central Asian nation’s leader called “catastrophic” cold weather that has left only the capital, Dushanbe, with regular power supplies. “There has never been anything like it in our country’s history,” President Emomali Rakhmon told Putin at the Russian leader’s residence outside of Moscow on Thursday. “In the east now it is minus 25 degrees.” Putin promised additional aid on top of the diesel fuel and mobile power generators Russia has sent, according to a transcript on the Kremlin’s web site. Rakhmon said his country of 7 million people has no regular power supplies outside Dushanbe, where electricity is available only eight hours a day. As many as 1 million children under the age of five are in danger from the cold weather, the United Nations Children’s Fund said last week. Aid agencies estimate at least 260,000 people in rural areas are in need of immediate food supplies and as many as 500,000 may face shortages in the future. Tajikistan, a mountainous country and former Soviet republic, shares borders with Afghanistan, China, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. The third straight month of freezing temperatures has caused $1 billion of damage, destroyed the country’s winter crop and killed almost 70 percent of livestock, Rakhmon said. Cases of respiratory infections, such as pneumonia, doubled this winter compared with the same period last year, the UN cited Tajikistan’s Health Ministry as saying. Power cuts and the cold weather contributed to the deaths of several newborn babies in hospitals, the UN said, citing reports. The Tajik leader wants assistance to build a hydroelectric power station to address the country’s shortage. “There is no other way,” he told Putin. “Tajikistan’s electricity deficit in winter amounts to 20.5 billion kilowatt-hours.” Ties between Russia and Tajikistan have been strained in recent times. Rakhmon was known as Rakhmonov until last year when he removed the Slavic “ov” from his name as part of a ban on registering newborn babies with Russian-sounding names, Kommersant newspaper reported at the time. He has also outlawed gold teeth in Tajikistan because he said it would be impossible to secure loans from international aid organizations when village teachers could demonstrate such wealth, according to the Moscow-based newspaper. The Tajik president has also sought to build a personality cult in the nation. Seven of Rakhmon’s books, including “Emomali Rakhmonov — the Nation’s Savior,” form part of the national school curriculum.
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