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UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs |
AFGHANISTAN: IDPs continue arriving in the south
KABUL, 15 April 2003 (IRIN) - The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) maintains that arrivals of internally displaced persons (IDPs) - mostly ethnic Pashtuns - in the south of the country as a result of harassment and insecurity in the north are continuing.
"We do have protection cases, human rights cases of Pashtuns coming from the north, still in small numbers, but continuing," Maki Shinohara, a spokeswoman for UNHCR, told IRIN in the Afghan capital, Kabul.
There are hundreds of thousands of IDPs throughout Afghanistan today, about 350,000 of whom are in the south, most of them in six displacement settlements in Kandahar and Helmand provinces.
"What is notable is that there are still people arriving at these settlements, fleeing harassment and insecurity from the northern provinces of Faryab, Jowzjan and Badghis," Shinohara said, noting that in the second half of March, 45 families had arrived at the livestock market in Kandahar, joining some 100 displaced families already there.
According to UNHCR some 15 percent of IDPs in the south are Pashtuns from the north, who might not be able to return in the near future.
"In some specific provinces of the north where there is factional fighting going on, there are some local commanders who have been confiscating land illegally, not only from Pashtuns - there have been others affected too - but mainly Pashtuns," Shinohara said, noting that the working group of the Return Commission in the north, composed of local authorities and the Afghan Human Rights Commission, was trying to make headway in identifying areas for possible return, and would then visit the displaced Pashtuns in the south with concrete proposals.
"Objectively, even if the situation might be OK for the people to come back, having the experience of being harassed out of their homes or the experience of fleeing from them, does take some time for the people themselves to be convinced and confident enough to go back," Shinohara said, adding that UNHCR was encouraging dialogue between the villagers as well as with the authorities in the north. "It's basically up to the authorities to regain the trust of their people and to work on solving the problems which are displacing people," she said.
During the course of last year, out of 1.3 million IDPs recorded as present in the country, over half a million returned to their places of origin. However, about 600,000 remain, half of them of them in the southern provinces.
"In terms of regions, the south is the most problematic area by far," Shinohara said, adding that the real challenge ahead was represented by the nomadic Kuchis, who formed 70 percent of the IDPs there, and were mainly from the Registan desert south of Kandahar city, as a result of drought and conflict. "They cannot really go back to the desert area right now, because they don't have land to graze on and they have lost their livestock."
UNHCR said it would continue to protect human rights cases and assist the most vulnerable among the displaced population.
"The practical goal is to stabilise the settlements and encourage self-sufficiency so that the majority of displaced people will no longer be dependent on relief aid," Shinohara explained, underlining that there was a need for income-generation and training, especially for Kuchis who would then be able to resume their nomadic life with new livestock and skills once the drought ended.
The UNHCR stresses that for it to be able to meet all these challenges, as well as to provide returnees and IDPs with assistance and community development, security is crucial. "Our staff in the south is shell-shocked, understandably, by the intentional killing of an international aid worker on 27 March," Shinohara said, noting that it would take some time - even psychologically - for the staff in the south to regain confidence in working out in the field and helping people in communities.
Meanwhile, UNHCR has warned that unless international governments supporting Afghanistan worked effectively towards improving the security situation, there would be less humanitarian aid, less development, less return and further instability. "If the security situation remains fragile, not only in the south, but especially in the north and elsewhere, what is of particular concern to UNHCR is the widening of ethnic divides and growing discontent among Afghan villagers, who would see less progress and development of their communities," Shinohara warned.
Themes: (IRIN) Refugees/IDPs
[ENDS]
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