Radio programme helps Afghans decide when to return

The office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is producing a programme with Radio Pakistan to help Afghan refugees in the country make informed decisions on repatriation. "The programme is running throughout Balochistan province for some 300,000 refugees living in 13 refugee camps, as well as in urban and rural settlements," Babar Baloch, a spokesman for UNHCR, told IRIN from the southwestern city of Quetta, capital of Balochistan. The 10-minute programme, aired twice a week on Wednesday afternoon and Sunday night, broadcasts details of the latest developments inside Afghanistan and provides updates on UNHCR's voluntary repatriation programme. "We inform them about the latest happenings in Afghanistan in different sectors of health, education, water, shelter and the road network. We also air interviews with Afghan delegations visiting Pakistan to inform refugees about the situation inside their country," Baloch said. The views of returned Afghans are also included in the programme so that people themselves have an idea about the situation there, Baloch added. "The programme is quite popular amongst refugees, as well as the Afghan population inside Afghanistan, according to feedback we receive in the form of letters and calls. It is very encouraging," Sohail Jaffar, a producer on the programme from Radio Pakistan Quetta told IRIN. "It is a package of 32 programmes running since mid-September, with nine programmes every month," Jaffar said. Jaffar further said that Sunday night transmission reaches up to almost all the Pashto-speaking areas of Afghanistan but Wednesday's programme could be heard only as far as Kandhar province. "We've hired presenters who speak Afghani Pashto instead of Pakistani Pashto," he added. UNHCR earlier this year also established an information centre for Afghan refugees in Quetta to increase their access to factual information about the changing conditions inside Afghanistan. "As the repatriation process is voluntary in nature, it is up to the refugees to decide when they can move back to their country. UNHCR for its part, tries to provide them with the maximum realistic information about their country of origin," Baloch said. The radio programme is part of UNHCR's mass information campaign for refugees that also includes the compilation of a bi-monthly bulletin in the Afghan capital, Kabul, distributed to Afghan refugees in Pakistan and Iran in Afghan languages. More than 2.3 million Afghan refugees have returned home from Pakistan under the UNHCR-facilitated voluntary repatriation programme since 2002 with more than 375,000 so far in this year. The UN refuge agency is running the programme under a tripartite agreement between the governments of Afghanistan, Pakistan and the UNHCR.