Alan Waddams, European Union ambassador to Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan, told a news conference in Dushanbe on 16 February that the international community will provide $20 million over the next two years to strengthen the border between Tajikistan and Afghanistan as Russian forces complete their handover of the frontier to Tajik control. \"Total aid from the European Union will amount to 6.5 million euros [$8.5 million] plus 2 million euros from Britain,\" he said. U.S. Ambassador to Tajikistan Richard Hoagland said that the United States will contribute $9.5 million. Russia has already handed over an 881-kilometer section of the border, and will transfer the Panj and Moscow sections of the Tajik-Afghan border by the end of 2005. (ITAR-TASS)