WFP resumes food aid to stranded Afghans

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) on Monday said it had resumed food distributions to 1,500 of an estimated 12,000 Afghan refugees stranded on flood plains on the Tajik-Afghan border. The announcement effectively breaks a stalemate that has existed since March between the UN and Tajik authorities over the presence of armed soldiers within the displaced population. The UN’s formal operations, including its feeding programme, were suspended on 13 March after a UNHCR investigation revealed that food and other relief aid intended solely for vulnerable civilians was also reaching soldiers. “I have visited the island myself five times, and I can confirm that the food aid is now going only to civilians,” said WFP director for Tajikistan, Bouchan Hadj-Chikh. “We are not giving aid to combatants.” In the last six months, 80,000 people have left their homes in northeastern Afghanistan because of heavy fighting between the Taliban and Northern Alliance troops in the Takhar and Badakhshan provinces. Most are settled in camps for internally displaced persons [IDPs] along the border with Tajikistan, where they are supplied with food, small stoves and temporary shelters made of mud or canvas. But an estimated 12,000 have been forced to seek shelter on flood plains on the Pyandzh river, where food and medicines are in short supply. Families have had little to eat, other than soup made of roots and leaves. Following UNHCR’s March findings that food was reaching combatants, a decision was taken to withhold future assistance until the Tajik government met three conditions. These were that civilians be moved to a safer area and separated from the soldiers, and that the Tajik authorities provide free and unrestricted access to the Afghans for NGO’s and UN staff. “These three stipulations have now been met. With the help of civilian and military leaders, we have sorted the people into two camps. Camp 13 holds the civilians, camp nine holds the combatants. Our aid is focused on the 1,500 civilians in camp 13, who really need our help,” Hadj-Chikh said. The issue of unrestricted access has also been solved: “WFP met with the Minister of Foreign Affairs. He arranged for us to have free access to the Afghan people for a period of three months.” Paul Handley from Merlin, a British NGO providing medical assistance to the population, confirmed reports that aid had resumed. “WFP has finally agreed to send food to site 13,” he said. But for some of the displaced people, aid is not enough. Many of the families wanted permission to cross into Tajikistan, to escape an increase in fighting between the Taliban and Northern Alliance in recent months, Handley said. Some families have shifted to a smaller area up-river to flee mainland shelling - a move prompted by the UNHCR’s stipulations. However, the newly built shelters were of “an even lower standard than the dwellings used previously”, Handley said.