UNHCR repatriation programme extended to Quetta

A repatration process run by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, (UNHCR) to enable Afghan refugees in Pakistan to return to their homeland, has been expanded to include the south-western city of Quetta, according to an agency official. “UNHCR resumed its repatriation operations in Quetta on Tuesday. About 31 families, comprising 174 individuals, were sent to Afghanistan on Tuesday after they underwent validation tests at the Iris Verification Centre (IVC) in Quetta,” Asif Shahzad, a UNHCR public information official, told IRIN in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad. The UNHCR repatriation process, under which about 1.9 million refugees have been repatriated from Pakistan since it started in 2002, was suspended in November last year, following the murder of a UNHCR worker in Afghanistan. The process re-started on 2 March across Pakistan, after UNHCR officials said they had received assurances from the governments of both Pakistan and Afghanistan about stricter security arrangements. However, the same day a religious procession in Quetta was attacked by terrorists who raked the Shia procession with gunfire before suicide bombers blew themselves up amidst the crowd, killing at least 44 people. A curfew was immediately clamped across the city after angry crowds rampaged through the city. Most of the returning refugees had been routed through Peshawar, the capital of the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP), until the security situation in Quetta was assessed to have returned to normal. “The curfew is still in place in some parts of Quetta. According to the authorities, the curfew is expected to be lifted completely by next Monday, which means UNHCR staffers will be able to work more easily with the many more refugees that will want to return to their homeland,” Shahzad maintained. However, Peshawar - the only other city to have an IVC - saw the process continue smoothly. By Wednesday, around 1,507 families comprising 8,511 individuals had been sent to Afghanistan since the repatriation process re-started, Shahzad said. Returnees are provided a travel grant by UNHCR, which varies from $3 to $30 depending on the distance and $8 per person instead of the repatriation package of food and relief items that was distributed in previous years, an agency press release said. The iris verification process enables UNHCR to deter refugees - known as “recyclers” - from seeking assistance for a second time. “94 people were processed at IVC in Quetta, out of which 93 were okay results. They found one recycler. UNHCR will not give him assistance again,” Shahzad said. The repatriation programme is governed by a tripartite agreement between UNHCR and the governments of Afghanistan and Pakistan that runs through 2005. The status of Afghans who remain in Pakistan after that date will be decided later, the press release said. There are an estimated 1.1 million Afghans in refugee camps in Pakistan and an unknown, but substantial number, in other parts of the country, it added.