KANDAHAR (Pajhwok): As many as 6,000 Afghan refugee families have returned from Pakistan to southern Kandahar province this year, an official said on Sunday.
Mohammad Azem Nawabi, Kandahar refugees and repatriation department head, said more refugees returned from Pakistan to Kandahar this year compared to the previous year.
But the returning families say they have been struggling with lack of shelter, unemployment. They said no authorities except UNHCR have provided them assistance.
Haji Nasurllah has recently returned from Pakistan’s Quetta City with his 7-member family and currently lives in the 9th municipal district of the city.
He told Pajhwok Afghan News: “After 25-year of migration we decided to return back to our homeland, but the government did not provide us any help. Only the UNHCR provided us some cash assistance.”
He said they had been hoping the government would grant them land plots to construct houses, but having a home remained a dream.
Mohammad Arif, another newly returned refugee, said he could not find work and place for living. Arif said he had been expecting the government that it would provide them land plots but the authorities had not given land plots to refugees who had returned 16 years ago.
He said every Afghan refugee in Pakistan had been in trouble and wanted to return back to the homeland.
Kandahar refugees and repatriation director, Mohammad Azim Nawabi, said the number of refugees returning from Pakistan through Torkham border had increased this year.
He said last year 2,500 refugees returned, but their number increased to 6,000 in the past nine months of the current year.
He confirmed the refugees had only been assisted by UNHCR and the International Organization of Migration (IOM), but the Afghan government had done nothing about them so far.
However, he said work on a township in 1,200 acres of land for refugees was underway in Panjwai district.
Nawabi said Refugee and Repatriation Minister Sayed Hussain Alami Balkhi had traveled to Kandahar few months ago and inaugurated initial works on the refugee township.
The township would have facilities like clean drinking water, asphalted roads and electricity, he said, adding the plots would be distributed by a special delegation of the governor’s house.
But he said construction process of the township was going slow due to limited budget. The township would complete over the next nine months.
After making available essential services, 1,600 entitled refugees would be distributed land plots in the township in the first phase, he said.
He said only one township in Kandahar could not accommodate all the refugees and thus 10,000 acres of land in Zherai, Daman and Spin Boldak districts had also been allocated to the returnees.
Nawabi asked the Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation to resolve budget shortage problem and accelerate construction process of townships so that the refugees could start a normal life.
Though UNHCR has stopped supporting Afghan refugees, Afghans in Pakistan continued to return to their country, he said.
He added the IOM was currently providing edible and non-edible items to Afghan returnees who lived as unregistered refugees in Pakistan.
In addition to returning refugees, thousands of war-affected families from Helmand and Uruzgan provinces live in Kandahar.
The Kandahar refugees and repatriation director said 3,600 families from Helmand and Uruzgan had been displaced to Kandahar.
He added 2,900 of the displaced families had so far received aid from charity organizations.
A survey of the internally displaced families was underway and those who had not yet received aid would be provided with essential items.
Nawabi said the number of returning refugees would increase next year and the government must be prepared for that.
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