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Donors to visit CHT to assess security situation

STAR REPORT
A security assessment commission comprising representatives of the UNDP, the government and the army will soon be heading for the CHT region against the backdrop of renewed donor interest in providing development assistance in the region suspended since abduction of three foreigners in Rangamati in February last year.
The aim of the mission is to find out if donors could resume their development programmes in the CHT region without endangering the lives of the personnel of different aid and development agencies.
Any future assistance from donors for the region will depend on the outcome of this assessment.
After signing of the CHT peace accord in December 1997, donors had extended development assistance for the region. But the donor-assisted programmes were suspended after three foreign nationals in Rangamati were abducted last year.
Donors are still unsure about the overall security situation in the hill
districts due to ongoing fighting between the pro- and anti-peace treaty groups that has claimed about 100 lives so far since the signing of the CHT peace treaty in December 1997.
Under the circumstances, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) proposed to the government last month to authorise a security assessment mission comprising UNDP representatives and representatives of the army to find out about the overall security situation in the CHT.
As per UNDP's proposal, the security assessment was to take place from May 1 to 10. But as the government thought it should also have a role in the mission it asked to defer the date in order to include representatives from the CHT Affairs Ministry and the Foreign Ministry, sources said.
The date for conducting the assessment is yet to be fixed. However, according to highly placed government sources, the team will begin its work sometimes next week.
The UNDP's move came following a recent meeting between the top leaders of the pro-peace treaty PCJSS (Parbattya Chattagram Jana Sanghati Samity) and Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, and also in the wake of deteriorating law and order situation in the region.
Earlier, the Resident Representative of UNDP Jorgen Lissner in a letter to the CHT Affairs Ministry on April 24 proposed the move mentioning that donor countries and agencies are interested in participating in the development work of CHT but are nevertheless alarmed at the security situation in
CHT region.
The donors are also skeptical about the extent to which their development assistance would help in improving the law and order situation in that area.
In his letter, Jorgen Lissner, who is also the UN Resident Coordinator in Bangladesh, expressed UNDP's desire to have one or more army representatives included in the security assessment mission as it thought the army's role in security issues in CHT was vital, the sources said.
Taco Bottema, UNDP consultant from The Netherlands, is scheduled the lead the team. The team will prepare a report on the overall law and order as well as the security situation in the region and submit it to the donor countries and agencies.
The report titled 'Donor review of the CHT situation: Security assessment' will evaluate the situation in the three hill districts against the backdrop of increased armed fight between the PCJSS and the UPDF (United People's Democratic Front), the anti-CHT peace group.
About 100 tribal people have died in armed fight between PCJSS and UPDF after signing of the CHT peace accord in December 1997. In April alone, about 10 people died in armed clashes between the two groups as well as between the army and the UPDF.
The FAO country Representative also went to CHT on April 28 for a three-day visit.
Two months back, a team of the European Commission (EC) also visited the CHT region to have a first hand experience as to what future development programmes it could take for the region.