UNHCR Starts Assisting Return of Afghan Refugees

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Saturday, March 02, 2002

UNHCR Starts Assisting Return of Afghan Refugees

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Around 200 Afghan refugees in neighboring Pakistan received assistance from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on Friday in their return to their home villages and towns in Afghanistan.

The refugees were first registered at the Tarkhtabarg repatriation center near Peshawar, a city some 150 kilometers northwest of the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, Yunus Hassan,

senior regional media officer of the UNHCR, told Xinhua over the telephone.

They then received assistance in Jalalabad, about 120 kilometers southeast of Kabul, from the UNHCR after entering Afghanistan, he said.

There are more than 5 million Afghan refugees in the world, and most of them are living in neighboring Pakistan and Iran. With the recent improvement in the security situation in Afghanistan and in the weather, some of the refugees are returning to their homes.

The repatriation of the refugees was conducted on a voluntary basis, according to Hassan.

So far up to 160,000 Afghan refugees have returned from Pakistan and Iran on their own since January, and the UNHCR is going to assist those who are willing to come back, he said.

Each family of the refugees who are voluntary to return will receive 100 U.S. dollars for transport from the UNHCR and 150 kilograms of grain from the World Food Program, and the UNHCR will provide shelter and other daily necessities such as water buckets, windows and doors and kerosene lamps to them once they reach their respective villages, he said.

The UNHCR will start a similar project on April 1 to help the return of Afghan refugees in Iran.

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