Repatriation of Afghan refugees living in urban areas begins

Monday saw the first repatriation of Afghan refugees who had been living in urban areas of Pakistan. Assisted by the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), some 100 families from the country's capital, Islamabad, and the southwestern city of Quetta returned. "With the ongoing returns from camps, we are also emphasising on urban repatriation," a UNHCR spokesman, Barbur Baloch, told IRIN on Tuesday from Quetta. Some 89 families, numbering 438 individuals, left Quetta for home, while another nine families left Islamabad. UNHCR's voluntary repatriation drive this year will target Afghans living in cities throughout Pakistan. It believes that such an emphasis is necessary to balance numbers with the trends last year when more than 80 percent of 1.6 million Afghan refugees returned from refugee camps in the country. Aid agencies and the Pakistani government estimate that half a million Afghans still live in the country's urban centres. UNHCR is planning to repatriate some 600,000 Afghans this year. Since the beginning of assisted repatriation this year, some 8,500 individuals, comprising about 1,600 families have gone home, with 150 families crossing into Afghanistan daily. Compared to last year, the number of returnees is far lower. "Last year, people heard that things were normal in Afghanistan, and they rushed there. But now they have realised that things are not that good, and they are moving in lower numbers", Baloch said, adding that returnee numbers from the southern port of Karachi were picking up.