U.S. Committee for Refugees World Refugee Survey 1999 - Afghanistan

Between 540,000 and 1 million Afghans were internally displaced in 1998. More than 2.6 million Afghans were refugees in neighboring countries, including 1.4 million in Iran, 1.2 million in Pakistan, 16,000 in India, and 8,000 in neighboring Central Asian republics. Hundreds of thousands of other Afghans who may have left Afghanistan because of the conflict or fear of persecution lived in the Gulf states as migrants or undocumented workers. An estimated 107,000 Afghans repatriated from Pakistan and Iran during 1998.

Repatriation

UNHCR reported that the number of Afghans who have repatriated surpassed the 4 million mark in 1998 – a record for any refugee group in the world. Some 350,000 Afghans repatriated from Pakistan between 1989, when Soviet troops pulled out, and the fall of the Soviet-installed Najibullah regime in early 1992. Nearly 1.4 million Afghans repatriated from Pakistan and Iran in the first nine months after Najibullah's fall. Almost 1 million more repatriated in 1993. Repatriation then slowed significantly, as fighting escalated between the various Mujahedin groups that overthrew Najibullah.

Approximately 107,000 Afghans voluntarily repatriated with UNHCR assistance during 1998. A large majority, some 93,000, repatriated from Pakistan.

UNHCR's repatriation program focused on projects aimed at providing refugees the wherewithal to survive upon return. In Pakistan, it provided extended families, or even entire communities repatriating, a six-month supply of food, seeds, and materials to help rebuild their homes.

The number of Afghans who repatriated from Iran was difficult to estimate. According to UNHCR, some 14,000 Afghans repatriated from Iran with UNHCR assistance during the year. Of those, 12,512 repatriated in November and December through a special program offered by UNHCR and IOM to Afghan refugees in Iran who had not been registered by the Iranian government. On October 31, the Iranian government had announced that all Afghans in Iran "illegally" would be required to leave Iran by November 21. UNHCR and IOM initiated the special program to enable Afghans in that category to repatriate with assistance.

It was particularly unclear how many Afghans repatriated voluntarily but without UNHCR assistance, or involuntarily, during 1998. In November, the director-general of Iran's Bureau of Aliens and Foreign immigrant Affairs (BAFIA) said that 30,000 Afghans repatriated between March and November 1998. At year's end, the governor of Khorosan Province said that 95,000 Afghans had repatriated just from Khorosan Province during the year (giving no indication of how many did so voluntarily and how many were deported).

In March 1998, a new Japanese-funded repatriation and rehabilitation program implemented by a consortium of UN agencies, including UNHCR, WFP, WHO, and UNDP, went into effect. According to UNHCR, the program sought to help returnees overcome major obstacles by providing them "meaningful assistance," such as the repair of infrastructure and de-mining of their land. Repatriation efforts were set back in August and September when the UN removed most of its foreign staff from Afghanistan following the U.S. air attack on an alleged terrorist base in Afghanistan.

Internal Displacement

The number of internally displaced Afghans is unknown. However, 120,000 people resided in the Sar Shahi camp near Jalalabad, which is run by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance (UNOCHA). UNHCR created the camp in 1994 to accommodate the large number of people at the border following a major exodus from Kabul after Pakistan had closed its border to new Afghan refugees.

Taliban offensives in northern Afghanistan in recent years, including in 1998, displaced hundreds of thousands more people. The Taliban's persecution of the Hazara minority has also led to displacement. Informed observers estimate that hundreds of thousands of Afghans besides those at Sar Shahi are internally displaced, but no reliable statistics regarding them exist. International humanitarian organizations have done little to identify or assist these persons. According to the head of the World Food Program, "The Taliban basically have been using camps [for the displaced] as lures for fresh troops to join the front line." They reportedly promised to provide food and shelter for the families of men who joined the armed ranks of the Taliban.

The U.S. State Department's estimate of the number of displaced persons in Afghanistan was 300,000 in 1998, but other sources believed the number could be a million or more. The International Committee of the Red Cross provided relief assistance to approximately 60,000 people outside Kabul, and reported that there were about 360,000 people displaced in Kabul.

If the above 420,000 people are added to the 120,000 displaced people living at Sar Shahi camp, the minimum number of internally displaced persons in Afghanistan would be 540,000. USCR therefore estimates that the total number of internally displaced Afghans in 1998 was no less than 540,000 and as high as 1 million.

Developments during the Year

Afghanistan has suffered from a bloody, 20-year civil war. In recent years, the mostly ethnic Pashtun Taliban, which espouses and imposes a strict interpretation of Islam, has taken control of most of the country. The Taliban enforces rigid moral codes on the population and restricts women's and girls' access to health care, employment, and education. Human rights organizations have sharply criticized the Taliban regime.

During 1998, the Taliban made significant advances into the northern provinces that had been the opposition's main strongholds. The majority of those opposing the Taliban are ethnic Tajik and Uzbek Shi'a Muslims living in northeastern Afghanistan.

In July, the Taliban mounted a successful offensive against Mazar-e Sharif, the opposition's de facto capital and northern Afghanistan's most important city. After they captured the city in August, Taliban fighters reportedly massacred thousands of noncombatant members of the Hazara population. Estimates of those killed ranged from 2,000 to more than 10,000. The UN Special Rapporteur on Afghanistan, Choong-Hyun Paik, reported that bodies were scattered on the streets of Mazar-e Sharif for up to a week because the Taliban would not permit relatives of the dead to remove them. The Taliban insisted that they only killed "those fighting the Taliban."

The Taliban's relations with Iran became further strained after the Taliban admitted to killing eight Iranian diplomats following its take over of Mazar-e Sharif. Iran responded by bolstering its forces along its border with Afghanistan to some 200,000 troops.

Conditions

An estimated 600,000 Afghans in the capital, Kabul, rely on foreign aid for survival. Yet the Taliban's relations with aid agencies were strained throughout the year. The regime's restrictions on women remained a source of friction. Those restrictions made it increasingly difficult for female aid workers to carry out their duties. CARE shut down its emergency feeding program for two weeks after Taliban members beat five of its female staff on May 24. The Taliban later sent a written apology and CARE reinstated its program. In June, the Taliban closed some 200 home-based schools for girls in Kabul.

A European Union fact-finding mission in April warned that the EU might limit aid unless the Taliban permitted NGOs to carry out their work more smoothly. At a major international conference convened in London on May 5, other donors also indicated that they might be less willing to provide assistance unless the Taliban ensured that aid would reach those in need.

The warnings had little impact on the Taliban. In late June, it ordered all aid agencies to shift their headquarters from Kabul's former diplomatic enclave to an abandoned polytechnic college building that lacked water and electricity and was badly damaged from the war. The Taliban told the NGOs that they would have to pay the estimated $1 million needed to repair the building. It also said that if the NGOs did not agree, they would have to leave the country. The international community expressed outrage over the ultimatum; the UN Security Council condemned the order.

The NGOs refused to move, and in late July the Taliban ordered some 200 aid workers from 38 organizations to leave Kabul. Only some UN agencies, ICRC, and CARE remained in the country to assist internally displaced persons and others in need. Tension between the Taliban and international aid groups escalated further when two Afghan UN workers were kidnapped and killed in mid-July near Jalalabad.

The European Union also condemned the Taliban for its harsh treatment of the EU's local staff. In July, the EU terminated all funding to Afghanistan and urged aid agencies to pull out. The EU had been Afghanistan's largest aid donor, providing nearly $150 million to the country in 1997 alone.

An August agreement between the Taliban and the UN led the NGOs to return to Afghanistan, although under heavy restrictions. However, many aid workers again left the country just days later after the United States bombed an alleged terrorist base in Afghanistan (in retaliation for a terrorist attack on the U.S. embassy in Kenya).

By the end of the year, most aid agencies had pulled out of the country either because of security concerns or disputes with the Taliban over the agencies' inability to implement programs effectively.