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| August 18, 2003 | Monday | Jumadi-us-Sani 19, 1424 |
DPs repatriation to be reviewed
ISLAMABAD, Aug 17: The tripartite commission on repatriation of Afghan refugees (from Pakistan) is holding its second quarterly meeting in Kabul on Aug 27 to review the pace of repatriation, official sources said on Saturday.
The government has suggested to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to sponsor and fund a regular census of the Af-ghan refugees population living in some 71 camps across the country in order to recon-cile the figures which were earlier collected by the government and the UNHCR, officials said.
There is confusion about the number of remaining Afghan DPs on Pakistan soil as the UNHCR puts it at only about 2.6 million whereas the government of Pakistan estimates the figure at 3.1 million still living in various camps of the country.
The government had plans to close down a number of known refugee camps in Peshawar, particularly the famous Kacha Garhi which houses over 70,000 refugees on Jamrud road but was restrained by President Musharraf from doing so till March next year on the request of Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
The camp was scheduled to be wound up by June this year.
The tripartite commission was set up as a result of an agreement signed at Geneva in last March to repatriate around 1.8 million refugees in three years (by December 2005) at the rate of 0.6 million refugees a year.
The sources said that the government of Pakistan was deeply concerned with the dismally slow pace of Afghan DPs repatriation under tripartite agreement due to various reasons, including the border skirmishes and a sense of insecurity inside the war-battered country.
Besides, there was a general impression that the Karzai government dominated by the Northern Alliance was unable to give equal attention to predominantly Pashtoon populated areas bordering Pakistan which was hampering return of most of Pashtoon refugees to their homeland.
Talking to Dawn Chief Commissioner Afghan refugees (CCAR) Syed Asif Shah has said that against the figure of 0.6 million fixed for the current year only about 0.35 to 0.4 million Afghan DPs were expected to return their homeland as only about 0.258 million had been recorded to have returned under the scheme since last March.
The tripartite commission which comprises two representatives each from Pakistan, Afghanistan and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) had held its first meeting in Islamabad in last May.
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