AFGHANISTAN: IRIN Special Report on unexpected new refugee flow
TORKHAM, Khyber Pass, 7 November (IRIN) - Afghans who have never before
fled their homes, not even during the Soviet war, are arriving at the
Torkham border post between Afghanistan and Pakistan's North West Frontier
Province (NWFP) in their hundreds each day. Cornered at home by fighting
and drought, they are seeking refuge in Pakistan, where the relief
community is ill-equipped to cope. The Office of the UN High Commission
for Refugees (UNHCR) has said it is witnessing "an entirely new movement
of refugees" from northeastern Afghanistan, and agencies assisting the
new arrivals complain of critical funding shortages.
Since September, almost 30,000 Afghan refugees, mainly of Tajik origin,
have crossed the border at Torkham. Fifty to 60 families have arrived here
daily in recent weeks and the numbers are increasing, according to UNHCR.
The new arrivals are severely testing the agency's limited resources, and
there are concerns that continued fighting between the Taliban movement
and the opposition Northern Alliance, as well as the onset of winter, will
force more Afghans to leave their homes.
"Most of these new refugees are ethnic Tajiks from a very fertile part of
the country. Even when the Russians were there, they stayed on. Fighting
is on their front line. They are not able to plant anything. Canals were
destroyed in the '99 offensive. This is a completely new movement as far
as refugees are concerned," UNHCR spokesman Yusuf Hassan told IRIN.
One such new arrival was Sadar, a 36-year old shopkeeper who fled his home
in Taloqan, the capital of Takhar province, after it was taken by the
Taliban in September. He and 11 family members travelled for five days:
"There were rockets, bombardments. I cannot speak. I am very tired. Five
days ago our home was destroyed by artillery fire. My uncle and brother
were killed in rocket fire. We left everything. The situation was total
anarchy. People fleeing from one side to the other, from the Taliban side
to the opposition side."
Sadiqa, a 50-year-old mother of eight, sold all her possessions to pay for
the journey by minibus. "There was war behind us and we feared the
fighting would reach our village. Some of our land was mined and
drought-affected. Our area was controlled by the Taliban. It is because
of the Taliban that we are here. We were given no help."
For the majority of the new arrivals IRIN met, fleeing to Pakistan was the
only option. They spoke of "cultural affinity", of relatives there, and
said it was easier to integrate. Going to Tajikistan was impossible with
the border sealed, and the cost of travelling there or to Iran was simply
too high to consider, they said.
Exhausted, the new arrivals in Torkham still have to make their way from
the border to their ultimate destination. For some, this is to family
members in Karachi, in the southern province of Sindh, or Lahore, capital
of the eastern province of Punjab; for the ethnic Hazara minority it is
mostly to the southwestern province of Balochistan; and for the remaining
new arrivals, it is to the New Shamshatoo refugee village, a one and a
half hour drive from Torkham.
Shamshatoo is a long established camp but, earlier this year, a section of
the camp - abandoned after an earlier repatriation programme - was
reopened to admit 300 families from a makeshift site in Jalozai near
Peshawar. Now it is home to 2,850 families.
With pre-existing malnutrition compounded by their long journey, many of
the refugees arrive at New Shamshatoo in urgent need of assistance. Until
their registration papers arrive from the border, many have to camp out in
the open with little shelter. The old and the weak often develop
pneumonia.
IRIN spoke with one such family who had been waiting a day for assistance,
camped out with their only remaining possessions: a bag with five-day old
bread and some clothing. Thirty-year-old Abdul Basid from Taloqan said
that when he and his family reached Torkham, UNHCR had asked for their
papers but they had none to present. "A rocket hit my house and I have no
papers, nothing. We arrived here yesterday. We are waiting for some
assistance... The Taliban is controlling our city. The surrounding areas
and the hilltops are controlled by the opposition. There is a lot of
retaking and pushing back and retaking... While the war is on I will not
go back," he said.
Relief efforts at Shamshatoo have been hampered by poor water quality,
which has led to secondary diseases such as severe dysentry and diarrhoea.
Dr Javed Pervez, Deputy Director of the UNHCR-funded refugee programme and
head of the New Shamshatoo health clinic, said the situation was the worst
he had encountered. "Water has not been fit for human consumption so we
were seeing many water-related diseases. That's now improved. We are also
seeing malnutrition of about 30 percent. They are already undernourished
in Afghanistan. Through travel, no food, poor water quality and secondary
diseases, we are experiencing full blown cases of malnutrition which we
need to address urgently," he told IRIN.
UNHCR is responding by providing a high-calorie milk and sugar package,
though Pervez questioned the level of its success, saying that milk
intolerance was a common complaint among malnourished populations. WFP is
providing wheat, flour pulses and oil to each family on arrival, while a
Danish organisation Dacaar is drilling 30 shallow wells to add to the 11
that provide 7,000 litres of water per day. Shelter Now International has
set up a mud-house construction programme and is building communal
latrines.
The refugee population in Shamshatoo numbered 1,300 families (or about
7,800 individuals) last week, and the number is still rising. Every day
400 people present for medical help for water-borne diseases. Doctors are
being vigilant, for fear that one case of cholera or meningitis in such
crowded and unsanitary conditions could lead to an epidemic.
The international health NGO Medecins sans frontieres (MSF) has completed
a measles vaccination campaign, and mobile teams are about to embark on a
community tetanus programme targeting females of child-bearing age.
But this is not enough, according to Pervez, whose medical team is sorely
strapped for cash. "We are funded by UNHCR but they have no resources at
the moment so we have taken our doctors from other health units. At times
we simply cannot cope. Now we are seeing a high incidence of malaria", he
said.
"It is the worst kind of situation we have encountered, especially the
support from donors. Everyday there has been an influx and the situation
is worsening - healthwise at least," he added.
Noor Mohammad, 37, from Takhar Province told IRIN how he and his family
had fled their country for the first time, even after withstanding the war
against the Soviet occupation. "It is the first time I have been a
refugee. Our village was caught between the Taliban and the opposition
forces. The Taliban arrested me for one week on suspicion of helping the
opposition." During the treacherous journey to the border his teenage
daughter died of stomach problems.
Competition for resources
This is not an isolated incident. Last month, WFP warned that as many as
one million could die if it was forced to shut down its emergency
operation in Afghanistan. Global competition for humanitarian funding is
high, and the donor response for Afghanistan has been slow.
The head of UNHCR's sub-office in Peshawar, Roy Herrmann, attributed the
funding shortfall to competing demands for refugee issues in Europe.
Afghanistan has the largest refugee population in the world at 2.6
million, but per capita funding for Afghan refugees amounts to just $14,
compared to $286 for refugees in Europe, he said.
Of UNHCR's global budget, only 1.7 percent was available for operations in
Pakistan. So far, this year, only half of the UNHCR's annual budget of $43
million for Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran had been received, he said.
"This is the worst shortage of funds I've seen in 17 years. We need more
money very badly", Herrmann added.
According to him, very little money was going into development projects in
Afghanistan. Until more resources were received, it was very hard to
persuade the refugees to go home. "There is nothing for them at home: no
work, their crops have failed, the infrastructure is falling apart", he
said.
Increasing economic burden on Pakistan
UNHCR estimates there are 1.2 million Afghans in Pakistan but the
Government of Pakistan puts the figure at almost two million. Colonel
Abdul Hafeez, a commissioner for Afghan refugees responsible for
repatriation, said the new arrivals were creating an economic burden for
Pakistan. "There are three types of people coming from Torkham: those that
are war-affected from Takhar and Kunduz provinces; they are real genuine
refugees who we want to help. The second category are drought-affected
and financially poor. The third are job-seekers. They know there is work
here so they are rushing to Pakistan. These two categories are real
burdens which are affecting the economy."
The daily wage of a labourer in Pakistan is 50-60 rupees (or roughly $1),
while Afghan men are working for half that, forcing competition among
their Pakistani counterparts. The problem is most visible in Peshawar
where, in a population of approximately 2 million, at least 700,000 are
Afghan, according to Hafeez.
Meanwhile, the announcement on Friday that the Taliban and the Northern
Alliance have agreed in writing to a process of dialogue has come late in
the day for these weary refugees. Francesc Vendrell, UN Secretary-General
Kofi Annan's Personal Representative for Afghanistan, told reporters at UN
Headquarters in New York on Friday that the agreement provided for either
direct or indirect talks, with the active participation of the
Secretary-General or his Personal Representative.
Vendrell said he would shuttle between the two sides or meet them
separately in the same location until they were ready to meet face to
face. He added that he would use the time leading up to the Islamic holy
month of Ramadan to push the two sides to agree on a substantive agenda.
A ceasefire would be a "major element" of that agenda, with other key
elements which should be discussed were: the need to legitimise any party
that would rule Afghanistan; the need for a Government that would rule in
accordance with the will of the Afghan people; Afghanistan's relations
with its neighbours; human rights; and the treatment of women, Vendrell
said. But he cautioned against hopes for a quick outcome. "I think if this
process is going to achieve results, it is going to be long," he said.
Meanwhile, new Afghan refugees continue to arrive and the situation of
those already in Shamshatoo gives ever more cause for concern.
UNHCR's Yusuf Hassan told IRIN: "We are in desperate need of more funds,
as the funds we have are mainly for the Afghan refugees who are already
here [in Pakistan]. This is a significant number that we did not plan for
and were not anticipating."
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