PESHAWAR, Sept 3: A Norwegian organisation has suspended its free legal assistance service to Afghan refugees in the NWFP due to “administrative reasons”, officials said.

Simon Russell, the Norwegian Refugee Council’s project director, confirmed that his organisation had stopped its workers from visiting refugee camps in the province but he refused to say why.

The council has been providing free legal aid to Afghan refugees in the NWFP for the last three years.

Commissioner Afghan Refugees, Shahibzada Anis, said that a scrutiny committee constituting representatives from CAR, Intelligence Bureau (IB), Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) and ministry of Safron regulate the working of all organisations dealing with refugees.

The committee is empowered to suspend or restore the working of any of these organisations.

Mr Anis said although the activities of the NRC staff had been suspended for some time they had now been restored.

The ministry of state and frontier region (Safron) and the commissionerate of Afghan refugees had been upset with the advocacy unit of the Norwegian organisation and had criticised its publications as being anti-government and ‘not balanced’, sources said.

The staff at free legal aid centres (FLACs) was directed not to take any criminal case and avoid cases involving government officials. The FLAC was also told not to take up cases of Afghan refugees arrested under section 14 of the Foreigner Act, sources said.

The FLACs were criticised for not taking up cases of Afghans versus Afghans. Most of the cases taken up by the FLACs were that of Afghan refugees versus government officials including police and Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) officials. Afghan refugees often complained of harassment at the hands of police officials.

The publications were criticised for sympathizing with Afghan refugees and neglecting problems created by them in Pakistan, including involvement of Afghan refugees in law and order-related problems, sources said.

Since 2002 the NRC has been running five FLACs at Peshawar, Taimergara, Abbottabad and Kohat with over 50 staff members with the financial assistance of Norway and the European Union (EU).

The Taimergara Free Legal Aid Centre (FLAC) was recently shifted to Chakdarra with all the male staff only due to security reasons. All the women workers were posted at the Peshawar office, a staff member told Dawn.

Mr Russell has hinted that a ‘change of programme’ was possible after the completion of the free legal aid programme in December this year. The NRC has signed a memorandum of understanding with the UNHCR and provides information regarding the repatriation programme.

The main focus will remain on urban Afghan refugees and the FLAC will take up cases concerning land disputes, according to Mr Russell. Until now some 4,000 cases of refugees in Pakistan have been taken up by the FLACs.

“The Afghan refugees seeking legal assistance in money matters will be taken up by lawyers at FLACs and pending cases will be completed from now on,” sources said on the condition of anonymity.