PESHAWAR: As the federal and provincial governments are scrambling to enforce lockdown to halt the spread of novel coronavirus, the UN agencies have yet to reach out to the vulnerable Afghan refugees, especially widows, and make arrangements for their sustenance.

Officials dealing with documented and undocumented Afghans say vulnerable groups, including widows and persons with disabilities, are their major concern as the government has enforced a lockdown across the country to fight the virus.

“Our major worry is Afghan widows, daily-wage workers and persons with disabilities who have also been confined to camps like other citizens,” an official said.

Official says widows, daily-wagers, special persons our major worry

Currently, Pakistan hosts 1.4 million registered refugees in addition to around 880,000 individuals having Afghan Citizen Cards, according to official estimates.

The UNHCR, which is mandated to look after all basic needs of refugees, including food, has so far restricted its activities to medical supplies.

The agency dispatched sanitary clothes, soap and disinfectants last week that would be provided to health facilities in support of the refugees and host communities in Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab, said an official statement issued by the UN agency.

The UNHCR, however, has yet to reach out to the most vulnerable groups of refugees since their movement has been restricted to camps in KP and other parts of the country.

Spokesman for the UN agency Qaisar Khan told Dawn that his organisation had provided medical equipment and modern ambulances to the KP government for responding to the outbreak of Covid-19.

He said more relief items would be dispatched in the coming days.

Pakistan has a total of 53 designated refugee villages, including 43 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Officials said 32 per cent of the total refugee population lived in camps, while the rest lived in cities and rural areas.

They said around 300,000 refugees lived in 43 refugee villages across KP, which currently hosted one million registered refugees.

Commissioner Afghan Refugees Abbas Khan told Dawn that the commissionerate in collaboration with the UN agencies had begun collecting the data of vulnerable groups, including widows in refugee villages of KP.

He said the data compilation process was likely to be completed in one week.

“The commissionerate and UN agencies are trying to figure out vulnerable refugees in camps and work out a mechanism to assist them,” he said.

The commissioner said the federal authorities and representatives of the UN agencies had put their heads together to work out a plan for the help of the destitute refugees.

Sources said the Commissionerate for the Afghan Refugees would hand over six well-equipped ambulances and several housing units to the KP government to help minimise the spread and impact of the virus.

They said every housing unit had the capacity of 16 beds.

Published in Dawn, April 1st, 2020