Thousands of Afghans pour in

Some 5,000 Afghan refugees crossed into Pakistan’s southwestern city of Quetta on 20 October, the largest number in a day so far, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), with up to 15,000 people reported stuck in no-man’s-land on the Afghan side at the Chaman border crossing. The BBC reported that another 6,000 had crossed on 21 October; however, this has yet to be confirmed by the refugee agency. Over the past few weeks thousands have fled Afghanistan in fear of US-led air strikes aimed at Taliban assets and terrorist training camps.

“The city [of Kandahar] is empty. There are only Taliban soldiers and Arabs left there,” Ahmadollah, a refugee who had just arrived in Quetta, told IRIN after crossing over from the southeastern province of Kandahar. He and his six family members had official papers and were allowed to enter Pakistan, but said they had been harassed by Pakistani police.

“We were stopped several times, and I ended up paying 1,500 Pakistani rupees [US $25] in bribes,” he said, describing this as a common problem faced by Afghans. He added that not only had the city been brought down by the bombings but also that the Taliban were recruiting young men to join what it has termed a jihad, or holy war.

Pakistani officials have said only refugees in possession of official documents will be allowed to enter. However, UNHCR has urged the authorities to accommodate the flow of refugees. “We think anyone who needs asylum should be able to get into the country. These people need food and shelter,” Peter Kessler, the UNHCR spokesman in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, told IRIN on Monday.

All the countries neighbouring Afghanistan have closed their borders in fear of a major influx. This has raised concerns for the refugee agency, which has urged them to reopen their borders to avert a humanitarian disaster.

The UN has estimated that up to a million Afghans could cross into Pakistan in a worst-case scenario, adding to the two million already there. The Pakistani government was reluctant to allow more refugees in, but has agreed to do so on a temporary basis, on condition that it receives financial backing from donors to cope with the extra burden.

With such a large number crossing the border in any one day, tensions ran high at the weekend, and police clashed with Afghans trying to enter, the BBC report said. It added that there had been incidents of stone-throwing.

Once inside Pakistan, the refugees face another problem - finding food and shelter. UNHCR has identified two key sites at the Chaman border to receive them. However, Kessler said the sites were “far from complete”. “The serious security situation in Quetta has slowed down our progress in preparing these sites,” he said. Asked where the new arrivals were staying, he said: “Most are going to live with relatives or are going to established camp sites.”

In order to cope with this latest influx, Kessler said the refugee agency had sent several trucks carrying tents, blankets and food to the Chaman border. He added that the agency needed to build up a stockpile at the sites in time for the new arrivals. With the risk of disease breaking out among refugees still waiting to cross, medical teams were also expected at the border.

As the US continues its war against terrorism inside Afghanistan, newly arrived refugees said Kandahar was virtually empty and that food was scarce. UNHCR quoted some Afghans as claiming that their relatives had been killed in the bombings. There are, however, reports of commercial traffic still crossing the border in both directions.

Meanwhile, preparations in Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province (NWFP) were also continuing, Kessler said. UNHCR has sent teams to assess sites and is continuing work on areas marked for camps. The refugee influx from eastern Afghanistan into the NWFP was said not to be as large as that in southwestern Pakistan, he said. Nonetheless. These refugees too face a difficult and dangerous journey trying to cross the border, as many do not have official documents.

Sardar Khan, aged 45, spent two days travelling from the central Afghan province of Loghar, and is now living in a tent with about 50 other newly arrived refugees at a makeshift settlement in the district of Tajabad in the NWFP’s provincial capital, Peshawar. He and his five family members said they were in desperate need of food and shelter, but glad to be out of Afghanistan. “Only civilians have suffered so far. We didn’t see any dead bodies of the Taliban,” Khan told IRIN.

Abdul Sabay, a refugee at Tajabad from the eastern city of Jalalabad, told IRIN that he too had endured a long journey over the border, and that there was nothing left of his village. “We could hear the bombing, we had to get away. Thank God we are here now.”

Other refugees referred to the food packages dropped by US aircraft, saying they had been too scared to open them in case they were some kind booby-trap to kill Taliban members. The airdrops have been criticised by some international NGOs, which said that they undermined humanitarian efforts to keep humanitarian action impartial and separate from military action.