05 February 2004	Thursday	13 Zilhaj 1424

PESHAWAR, Feb 4: The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) will issue birth certificates to newborns at Barkali refugee camp at Bajaur agency and the camps set up after the Afghanistan war in 2001.

According to a press release issued here on Wednesday, a programme was launched at Barkali refugee camp in the Bajaur Agency to issue birth certificates to newborn babies in Afghan refugee camp.

The programme was started initially in Balochistan for the refugee camps and it would be extended to other refugee camps set up to host 300,00 refugees who fled war in Afghanistan.

The birth certificate would prove as a document to protect the nationality of the Afghans. "It is extremely important for every child to have a birth certificate; this is the reason we are making a big event of this," Masti Notz, head of the UN refugee agency office in Peshawar said in the press release.

Hundreds of refugees assembled at the inauguration of the programme in the Barkali refugee camp of nearly 5,000 people in Bajaur agency in the rugged tribal area along the Afghan border.

The refugees were told at the gathering that the new document would record the baby's name and gender, date and place of birth, the father's name and place of origin.

According to the programme, initially birth certificates will be issued to only to those born over the past year in the refugee camps that were established for those fleeing the 2001 war in Afghanistan. So far, about 200 birth certificates had been issued in Barkali whereas 3,000 had been distributed in Balochistan.

The certificate would be signed by the UN refugee agency and the PDH, an organisation linked to the Pakistan government's commissionerate of the refugees that provides medical services under an agreement with the UNHCR, the press release said.

The Peshawar consulate of the interim government of Afghanistan had also agreed to endorse these new certificates of the refugees who decide to return to their homeland, the press release further said.

The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which has been ratified by 192 countries, also requires that all the children be registered immediately after birth and have the right to have nationality.