IRIN
AFGHANISTAN: Recent refugee influx ups pressure on aid agencies
29 September 2005


[This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United 
Nations]

KABUL, 29 September (IRIN) - The arrival of 21,000 Afghan families from 
Pakistan over the past six weeks has placed an additional strain on aid 
agencies in providing adequate humanitarian assistance, representatives 
say.

"The return of such a large of number over [such] a relatively short 
period of time just before the winter has created additional pressures 
for reintegration operations," Tim Irwin, a spokesman of the office of 
the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), said in the 
Afghan capital, Kabul, on Thursday.

Together with relevant government ministries, other UN agencies and 
non-governmental organisations, the UN refugee agency was working to 
ensure that families and individuals were able to settle in their places 
of origin before winter sets in, Irwin maintained.

As part of a previous decision made in 2004, Islamabad announced plans 
to close all refuge facilities by 1 August located across the Federally 
Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), a western restive tribal belt 
bordering Afghanistan, offering Afghan residents in the area the option 
of repatriating or relocating to any other site inside Pakistan.

That decision prompted more than 120,000 Afghans living in the refugee 
camps of the tribal Kurram and Bajaur agencies to head to Afghanistan - 
availing themselves of the voluntary UNHCR repatriation assistance 
package. The influx of FATA returnees included mostly those Afghans who 
had crossed into Pakistan in the early years of the Soviet-Afghan 
conflict in the late 1970s.

According to UNHCR, to date, the destinations of over 94,000 Afghans 
from Pakistan's tribal areas include the eastern and central provinces 
of Paktya, Khost, Nangarhar, Kunar, Logar and Kabul.

"Many of the families are returning to areas where there has been 
limited development due to the security situation," Jacques Mouchet, 
UNHCR representative in Afghanistan, said earlier this week in Kabul. 
"There are also a large number of individuals who left Afghanistan 25 
years ago and who face challenges in reintegrating into their former 
communities."

Under UNHCR's current voluntary repatriation assistance programme, 
returnees are eligible for transport assistance ranging from US $4 to 
$37 per person, depending on the distance to their destination. 
Additionally, they receive a grant of $12 each to help them with 
additional costs.

The return assistance is complemented by programmes designed to help 
returnees re-establish their lives in their places of origin.

To assist the returnees in their foremost need of shelter, the UN 
refugee agency plans to build some 24,000 housing units across the 
country in 2005. Of this, some 7,000 units were completed by the end of 
August, located primarily in the provinces of Kabul, Parwan, Logar, 
Kunduz and Balkh.

The refugee agency has also been working to increase access to fresh 
water, with water points for some 65,000 individuals across the country 
being dug - mainly in Baghlan, Faryab and Jawzjan provinces in the 
north, Kandhar and Uruzgan in the south, Herat and Nimruz in the west 
and Daikundi province, located in the Central Highlands.

Moreover, UNHCR has been running about 21 income generation projects 
across the fledgling state to assist poor communities in supplementing 
their earnings in southern, eastern, and central regions. These include 
poultry farming, road rehabilitation, tailoring and handicrafts.

Meanwhile, the Afghan government has also been helping by providing the 
returnees land for shelter. Recently, the Ministry of Women's Affairs 
announced its plans to build accommodation for at least 1 million 
vulnerable Afghan women across the country with a German construction 
firm.

Afghan repatriation, now in its fourth year, is the largest organised 
repatriation operation in the history of UNHCR. Since the repatriation 
effort began in March 2002 following the collapse of the Taliban regime, 
a total of 2.9 million Afghans have returned from Pakistan and 1.3 
million from Iran.

According to the latest figures, Pakistan still hosts some 3 million 
Afghans in the country, with another 900,000 living in Iran.


IRIN-Asia
Tel: +90 312 454 1177
Fax: +90 312 495 4166
Email: IrinAsia@IRINnews.org

[This Item is Delivered to the "Asia-English" Service of the UN's IRIN 
humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views 
of the United Nations. For further information, free subscriptions, or 
to change your keywords, contact e-mail: IRIN@ocha.unon.org or Web: 
http://www.irinnews.org . If you re-print, copy, archive or re-post this 
item, please retain this credit and disclaimer. Reposting by commercial 
sites requires written IRIN permission.]

Copyright (c) UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 
2005


- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Appropriate Donations for International Disaster/Humanitarian Needs
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Center for International                  web: www.cidi.org
     Disaster Information             listserv: www.cidi.org/listsub.htm
                                    guidelines: www.cidi.org/donate.htm
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Central Asia                  www.cidi.org/humanitarian/hsr/centralasia