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Children of Kabul Streets May Lose Their ''Nest''

Topic: The Taleban

Archives: April 2005

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BBC News
Kabul - April 13/2005
Tom Coghlan
Kabul street children may lose 'nest'

Afghanistan's internationally renowned charity for street children, Aschiana, survived the Afghan wars of the 1990s and the Taleban era.

However, the free market economics of Kabul's post-war boom now seem a more potent enemy than rockets and bombs.

Aschiana, which means "the nest" and provides support, food, education and a refuge to 10,000 street children, faces the closure of its main centre in Kabul.

It is the victim of rocketing rents and land prices rather than artillery.

The charity's compound on Char Rahi Malik Asghar, which it has occupied since 1997, has been sold by its owner to an international company.

A five-star hotel will be built on the site.

Kabul is a city in the grip of a housing boom that has seen the price of real estate soar to levels comparable with Western cities.

The three-acre Aschiana plot, close to the main government ministries, is believed to be worth nd $5m.working children

A small class of wealthy Afghan entrepreneurs and international companies have been the prime beneficiaries of the boom.

"Our rent for this site was $1,500 a month," says Aschiana's director and founder, Engineer Mohammed Yousef.

"We have been looking for alternative sites but rents in the centre of the city are too expensive now."

Much smaller sites further from the city centre, where most of the street children gravitate, now cost around $10,000 a month in rent.

Kabul has about 50,000 children working on its streets.

Many lost their parents during Afghanistan's 24-year conflict and they are often to be seen banded together and scavenging through rubbish.

Many make a meagre living polishing shoes or selling water, chewing gum or newspapers to drivers at busy junctions.

They often show the tell-tale, disfiguring scars of the parasite Leishmaniasis, which lays its eggs under the skin of those who live on the streets.

As well as sexual abuse and domestic violence, children at the centre have often suffered high levels of psychological trauma during the wars.

Trees felled

The early lives of many of the street children were dominated by the protracted siege of Kabul in the 1990s when random rocketing and gunfire by various militias killed an estimated 20,000 civilians.

Today children at the centre are still engaged in classes in art, music, dance, computing, sport and basic literacy.

"I don't want to tell the children that we are closing," says Engineer Yousef, above the sound of chainsaws.

[Marine]

Source: United States Agency for International Development (USAID)
Date: 08 Apr 2005
Rebuilding Afghanistan: Weekly activity update 01 - 08 Apr 2005 - Issue #82

Strengthening Economic Development
Afghanistan Development Forum held last week

The third annual Afghanistan Development Forum (ADF) was held in Kabul April 4-6 on the theme of “Accelerating Economic Development.” Over 300 delegates from the Government of Afghanistan (GOA) and the international donor community attended the conference, including USAID Deputy Administrator Frederick Schieck and USAID/Afghanistan Mission Director Patrick Fine.

President Karzai emphasized two key priorities of the GOA: accelerating the building of physical infrastructure (roads, water and electricity generation in urban areas), and institutional and human resource development. Most notably, he underscored the need to modernize the agriculture sector and increase productivity in order to fight poppy cultivation. U.S. Ambassador Khalilzad informed the ADF that the focus areas for the US Government will be security, private sector economic development, counter-narcotics, capacity and institution building, and contributing to Afghanistan’s role as a land bridge between Central and South Asia.

During the three day event, ADF discussions centered on eight themes:

Accelerating infrastructure development;

A pro-poor approach to economic growth and social protection;

Creating an enabling environment for private sector development;

Fiscal sustainability & public administration reform;

Review of the Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund (ARTF) and other trust funds;

Strengthening regional cooperation;

Fighting drugs and alternative livelihood; and

Security, justice, and equitable political participation.

Supporting Judicial Reform

Provincial Court of Appeals opens in Ghazni

On April 6, Deputy Administrator Frederick Schieck spoke at the opening of the newly rehabilitated Provincial Court of Appeals building in Ghazni province. The ceremony was attended by the Chief of Administration for the Supreme Court, the Chief of Facilities for the Supreme Court, the Deputy Chief Prosecutor from Kabul, the Chief Judge of Ghazni Province, representatives of the Judicial Reform Commission and about 40 other judges, prosecutors and village elders.

USAID rehabilitated and modernized the courthouse, originally built in the 1970s, and added a second story. The design was by an Afghan-American architect, Rafi Samizay, who managed a staff of 16 Afghan architects and engineers. Construction was bid out to a local Afghan construction company.

Strengthening the Government

Three industrial parks under construction

Industrial parks support economic growth in Afghanistan by serving as a mechanism for organizing and concentrating scarce public infrastructure resources. This encourages private investor interest, and generates employment opportunities. There are three industrial parks under various stages of construction in Afghanistan:

Kabul: Design and contracting stage complete. Though delayed by the severe weather, construction is underway. Thirty-four lots have been sold. Overall, about 65% complete.

Kandahar: Land preparation, sidewalks, sewage, and drainage designs are complete. Electricity and water supply designs are nearing completion. Overall, about 25% complete.

Mazar-e Sharif: Land preparation, roads, and sidewalk designs complete. Designs for water supply, sewage, electricity, and communication are underway. Overall, about 10% complete.

Security Incidents

Note: Hostile attacks are reported through USAID's security contractors and the Associated Press

Number of Hostile Attacks: During this reporting period, there were four hostile attacks resulting in one death.

USAID Related: During this reporting period, there were no hostile attacks directly affecting USAID related projects and/or staff. There were four other attacks against other aid agencies and NGOs.

Last Attack: On March 30, in the Guzarah district of Herat province, three rockets were fired into the Herat Airport. Two rockets struck the western side of the runway and the third rocket landed on the wall of the Airport Security compound, which shares a wall with the UNOPS (United Nations Office for Project Services) compound. The attack did not result in any casualties, and only minor damage to the Airport Security compound fence.

[Marine]

Source: United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
Date: 15 Apr 2005
Afghan delegation tours Pakistan to promote repatriation

ISLAMABAD, April 15 (UNHCR) – A delegation from northern Afghanistan has begun a UNHCR-sponsored tour of all provinces of Pakistan to tell refugees about improving conditions in the areas they fled up to 25 years ago and to hear their continuing concerns about returning.

"The benefit will be that the refugees living here in Pakistan will learn what recent developments have taken place in Afghanistan," said Samiullah Wardak of the Afghan government's Ministry of Rural Development. "On the other hand, our concerned authorities will also get informed about what problems and hardships Afghan refugees go through in Pakistan."

The nine members – including two people from the United Nations in Afghanistan – started their mission in Islamabad on Thursday and will visit areas throughout the country by the time they board a return flight to Kabul on April 28.

The team, the Returns Commission Working Group, was formed nearly three years ago to help remove obstacles in five provinces of Afghanistan where factional rivalries were hindering repatriation.

Since then, they have been trying to resolve problems in the provinces – Balkh, Sar-i-Pul, Jawzjan, Samangan and Faryab – and conveying the results to former residents living in camps for internally displaced people inside Afghanistan or refugees in Iran and Pakistan.

Although some 2.3 million Afghans have returned from Pakistan since 2002 and another 400,000 are forecast to repatriate this year, millions of Afghans remain in exile despite the end of the open warfare that raged in their homeland for more than two decades.

Many of them have established new lives in Pakistan and are reluctant to start over back in Afghanistan. Others, such as the thousands of residents of the slum area on the edge of Islamabad where the delegation went on Thursday, are poor Afghans who want promises of land or shelter before returning.

"If we are assured by the government that there will be land and other shelter facilities available to us once we go back, we are ready to leave even tomorrow," said Mohammad Zalmey, who was attending the session in an open-air mosque beside the mud-track that is the main road.

But the delegation is carrying a firm message: it is time for most Afghans to come back and join in the reconstruction; they will have problems but conditions in the country have improved markedly since the civil war ended with the overthrow of the Taliban in late 2001.

"Whenever you return, your problems may increase manifold – all of those who have returned in the last three years had problems. But they had to start somewhere," said Shujauddin, a representative of the Afghan Department of Refugees and Repatriation.

"Today the international community and other donor agencies are ready to help the Afghan people. This opportunity may not be there forever," he told Afghan men who jammed around the mosque. "You have to make your own decision."

This repatriation season will be the last full year of the current Tripartite Agreement between UNHCR and the governments of Afghanistan and Pakistan, which governs the UNHCR voluntary repatriation programme that assists Afghans wishing to return from Pakistan. It expires next March, but repatriation is mainly during the current April-October period of warm weather in Afghanistan.

The Afghan delegation is pointing that out in an intensive tour that is taking them through the Punjab capital of Lahore, the refugee camp of Mianwalli, the Punjab city of Attock, the North West Frontier Province of Peshawar, the Sindh capital of Karachi and the Balochistan capital of Quetta.

While any Afghan's decision to return to Afghanistan is voluntary and UNHCR is discussing with the government how to manage those Afghans who remain after the Tripartite Agreement expires, the UN refugee agency and the Pakistani government still believe repatriation is the best option for most people.

That is especially true for the Afghans who have been living for about two decades in the Katcha Abadi slum area of Islamabad, where the delegation started its work. The government wants to reclaim the land for development and its extended deadline for the residents to leave runs out this year.

The residents have the choice of repatriating to Afghanistan or moving elsewhere in Pakistan, but the team from northern Afghanistan was clear in the belief that they would be better off leaving Islamabad, where they specialize in rubbish collection, and return to their homeland.

"If they do not themselves return and build their homes and cultivate the land, it will remain in ruins forever," said Shujauddin. "Our request is that Afghans in Pakistan should come back now, as the United Nations is assisting them to voluntarily repatriate as well as helping them with their initial needs back in Afghanistan. It is a golden chance they should take advantage of."

By Jack Redden
UNHCR Pakistan

[Marine]

Source: United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA)
Date: 14 Apr 2005
Afghanistan: Press briefing by Ariane Quentier, Senior Public Information Officer, and by UN agencies in Afghanistan 14 Apr 2005

TALKING POINTS

Civic education campaign starting; first posters released

With the elections now scheduled for 18 September, the Joint Electoral Management Body (JEMB) is starting to publish material to inform Afghans of their rights and duties as voters - or as candidates. This is done in the framework of a countrywide civic education campaign, much like it was done during the Presidential Election.

Displayed behind me are the first two posters produced by the JEMB. As you see, the posters are in Dari and Pashto. One of them urges Afghans to vote for the Wolesi Jirga and the Provincial Councils. The other reminds voters they need to be registered to cast their ballots and for those who have not yet registered, they will be able to do so in the near future.

As more visual material will be released for the civic education campaign, they will all bear the same inscription, which you can read at the bottom of the posters in the section in green: “Vote and participate in the rebuilding of Afghanistan!” This will be the civic education campaign's trademark.

We have CDs on the side-table. Each includes a digital copy of both posters, in Dari and Pashto. Print media, please feel free to download the posters and publish them in your newspapers.

Three-week candidate nomination period to begin on April 30th

On April 3rd , the JEMB made a decision regarding candidate nomination for the elections. From April 30th until May 19th , candidates will be able to register their applications to run for the Wolesi Jirga or the Provincial Councils in Candidate Nomination Offices, which are currently established in each 34 province.

To do so however, potential candidates will have to meet specific requirements as stipulated in the Constitution, the Electoral Law and the JEMB regulations. Potential candidates will have to be registered as voters, be over the age of 18 - in the case of the Provincial Councils - and over 25 for the Wolesi Jirga; candidates will not be able to apply if convicted or deprived from their civil rights by a court decision. In addition, potential candidates will have to present a list of signatures of registered voters, provide a monetary deposit and sign and abide by the Code of Conduct for Candidates. One of the key points of the Code of Conduct is the compulsory declaration by candidates that they do not command – or belong to – illegal military forces or armed groups. Finally, in certain cases specified by the law, candidates may also have to resign from public office.

By 25 th May, a preliminary list of candidates will be finalized. From June 4th until June 9th , candidates and registered voters will be permitted to challenge the nomination of candidates on the preliminary list.

Flood Update

With the weather warming up, snow melting and heavy rains, the rising level of water in many Afghan rivers is now being closely monitored, as it is far higher than seasonal levels. Among the rivers being most watched are the Helmand river, which already provoked floods three weeks ago, the Amu Darya up North, the Logar river, the Heriroad river in Heart and the Panjshir river, which flows from the Panjshir valley all the way down to Pakistan through Parwan, Kapisa and Nangarhar. A joint assessment mission from the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development (MRRD), the Ministry of Water and Power, and the Department of Disaster Preparedness is currently evaluating the potential risk of floods along the Panjshir River for nearby inhabitants.

The rising levels of waters directly affect seven regions of Afghanistan , which are high-risk zones. These areas are in and around Kabul as well as in Heart, Kandahar, Khost, Nangarhar, Balkh and Kunduz provinces. According to the Ministry of Water and Power, floods in these provinces could affect up to 100,000 persons; therefore the pre-positioning and response mechanisms which have been put in place both at the central and provincial levels, bring together all those who may offer a valuable contribution in case of floods.

The issues I have just mentioned were discussed the day before yesterday (April 12th ) by the Disaster Response Committee. The Committee reviewed the situation throughout the country, and although no large-scale floods are currently happening the rising levels of water could signal a deterioration of the situation. This meeting, which is held once a week, was attended by representatives of the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development, Water and Power, Refugees and Repatriation, Public Works, Public Health, Interior, the Department of Disaster Preparedness the Municipality of Kabul as well as representatives of UNAMA, Coalition Forces or ISAF.

DDR reaches another milestone; 48,000 now disarmed

As of yesterday (Wednesday), 47,956 former soldiers and officers have disarmed according to the Afghanistan 's New Beginnings Programme (ANBP). With scheduled disarmaments of military units for today (Thursday), the total will be over 48,000.

Since the start of the Afghan year, on March 21, more than 4,000 Afghan Military Forces (AMF) personnel have disarmed and the disarmament program is on schedule to be completed by end of June 2005.

Meanwhile 42,543 former AMF personnel have either entered the reintegration phase or completed it. Reintegration provides support and training so former combatants can start new careers.

In terms of heavy weapons collection, so far 8,926 heavy weapons have been collected and are now in guarded compounds throughout the country. The only remaining significant amounts of heavy weaponry are in Kunduz (about 165), and the Shindand-Farah region where there are about 60.

Maimana Illegal Armed Group to voluntarily hand over weapons

For the first time, this Sunday (April 17), Afghanistan 's New Beginnings Programme will receive a significant number of weapons from a so-called Illegal Armed Group.

The former commander of 200 Division in Maimana Faryab Province will voluntarily hand over hundreds of light weapons, such as AK-47s. Fatulah Khan has already given ANBP a large stockpile of ammunition.

Both the weapons and the ammunition were never considered part of the AMF DDR process.

Fatulah Khan will be available for media interviews on Sunday morning following the ceremony in Maimana. The event is set for 11:30 am at the 35th Regiment Compound in Maimana. Commander Khan says he hopes that his actions will encourage others to voluntarily hand over weaponry.

Unlike in the DDR process, those handing over weapons and ammunition do not receive any reintegration benefits.

Members of ANBP's public information team will be on hand in Maimana to assist the media.

Afghanistan 's New Beginnings Programme has been helping the government with the initial planning for a nation-wide disarmament program aimed at Illegal, or criminal groups.

For further information about the proposed program please contact the government.

Rehabilitation of Kabul Male Detention Centre and Pol-e Charki prison underway

As part of the Criminal Justice Reform Programme, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) is running a project to rehabilitate both the Kabul Male Detention Centre and Block 1 of Pol-e Charki prison.

In Pol-e Charki, the new renovations, which began yesterday and will take two months to complete, will provide family meeting areas as required under the international Standard Minimum Rules for Prisoners. In addition, sports facilities and an exercise area will be built. Security fences will also be fixed.

This is the second phase of renovations. The restoration of the water supply, electrical and canal systems, the opening of a health clinic, and the construction of a kitchen were completed last June.

The Italian government contributed US $1,900,000 to reform the penitentiary system at the central level, of which US $170,000 has been allocated for the renovation of Pol-e Charki, Block 1.

As for the Kabul Male Detention Centre, the project activities include the rehabilitation of the water supply and electricity systems, the refurbishing of rooms and corridors, and the construction of security towers. Work began at the end of March and will take five months to complete. Again, financial support was made available courtesy of the Government of Italy in the amount of US $184,000.

UNODC is also ready to begin reform activities of the penitentiary system at the provincial level. With a funding frame of about US $10 million - of which US $6 million has been contributed by the Government of Italy - these changes will contribute to improve the quality of Afghanistan 's prisons.

UNODC has been working to improve Afghanistan 's prison system since 2003. Upgrading the working conditions of the prison staff through renovation of facilities, and training the prison staff in management, ethic rules, and international conventions and regulations are also goals of the prison system reform.

A ceremony, to mark the initiation of activities under this project, was held yesterday (April 13) at Pol-e Charki. It was attended by Sarwar Danish, the Minister of Justice, Jolanda Brunetti, the Italian Ambassador, and Doris Buddenberg, the UNODC Representative for Afghanistan .

UNHCR, other agencies off to Pakistan to explain and listen to refugees' questions about returning to Afghanistan

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) together with the Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation is organizing a two-week mission to hold talks with Afghan refugees in Pakistan .

Under the slogan “Go-and-Talk” a ten-member delegation will be holding talks with Afghan refugees and Pakistani officials in five cities. The aim of the visit is to explain to refugees the reality of daily life in Afghanistan as well as to listen to concerns they may have about returning to their homeland.

The ten-member group, comprised of representatives from the Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation, the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development, the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC), the Return Commission, UNHCR and UNAMA, left for Pakistan yesterday (Wednesday April 13th ).

Similar “Go-and-Talk” visits have taken place in Iran and within Afghanistan for internally displaced persons.

More than three million Afghans have returned from Pakistan and Iran with UNHCR assistance since March 2002 when voluntary repatriation began.

MoWA holds workshop on National Action Plan for Afghan Women

During our last briefing we told you about the one-day National Action Plan workshop held by the Ministry of Women's Affairs with staff from the Ministry of Transportation and the support of the United Nations Women's Fund (UNIFEM) on April 10.

The workshop has resulted in a high-level commitment towards addressing women's issues in the transportation sector. The workshop, which brought together 45 participants including high officials and the deputy minister of the Ministry of Transportation discussed ways to improve transportation policy for women.

The results of the workshop will form part of the National Action Plan for the Women of Afghanistan being developed by the Ministry of Women's Affairs. The Ministry of Transportation is the first Afghan ministry to undertake this process.

More ministry-based planning workshops will be conducted in the next three weeks in order to develop the first draft of the Action Plan.

Questions & Answers

Question: Regarding DDR, was this commander from illegal militias or illegal armed groups - as you said?

Senior Public Information Officer: Illegal Armed Group, which is the official terminology used.

Question: Will this be just a collection of weapons or the disarmament of the commanders?

Senior Public Information Officer: It is disarming those groups. Under the umbrella of the Ministry of Defence, there were a number of military groups and units which became part of the Afghan Military Forces. But there were also a number of groups, with heavy and light weapons, which did not fall under the Ministry of Defence's umbrella, and therefore not under the DDR programme initiated by ANBP in October 2003 and to be completed in June. These other groups are the so-called Illegal Armed Groups – illegal because they are not under any legal framework and not under the umbrella of the Ministry of Defence. Because they are illegal, they have no reasons to be present in this country and therefore they should be disarmed. However, because they do not fall under the DDR programme, they will need another approach to be disarmed. But we are talking about disarmament.

Question: Do you have any developments in Kabul with the disarming of the 1 st Division?

Senior Public Information Officer: As I told you we had very slow progress with the 8th and 10th Divisions, and we are still waiting for full commitment from the 1 st Division.

Question: On the Illegal Armed Groups, will disarmament be voluntary or forced?

Senior Public Information Officer: As much as possible, disarmament will be on a voluntary basis. But as we indicated earlier, there will not be individual reintegration benefits for soldiers disarming. We will rather try to have a community-based approach where groups interfering with a community, by voluntarily disarming, will allow the community to receive benefits of different sorts.

Question: Is there a plan for the disarmament of Illegal Armed Groups?

Senior Public Information Officer: No yet, but a plan is looked into. We made an announcement about Maimana because it is an important issue. But the disarmament of the Illegal Armed Groups is something that is being discussed right now. The Government is looking at ways to do it and there is no final plan for the time being.

Question: Regarding the elections, the requirements for the candidates, is this final? The Electoral Law should still be amended…

Senior Public Information Officer: The requirements I have mentioned, like not to have been convicted by a court or not to have been deprived from civil rights are not being questioned in the amendments to the Electoral Law. Same for the number of signatures one needs to collect, the monetary deposit that is required, these are not questioned either in the amendments to the Electoral Law. That said, there are issues in the Electoral Law, which have nothing to do with the process of nomination of candidates that are still being reviewed and for which we are still waiting for a decision to be taken. But the reason why the JEMB [Joint Electoral Management Body] was able to make a decision on the 3 rd of April on the nomination of candidates is because this specific issue has nothing to do with the currently discussed amendments.

Question: Do you have any estimates on the number of Illegal Armed Groups and what will be the method used to disarm them?

Senior Public Information Officer: As you know there has been a mapping survey that has been done in the last months to look at where and how there are Illegal Armed Groups throughout the country. But the way you have to look at illegal groups is not so much in terms of numbers because there are such a variety of illegal groups, from small groups to bigger groups. The issue with Illegal Armed Groups is more what type of groups they are. In this respect, there is a sense that the presence of certain groups needs to be addressed before that of other. Those groups are those who could have a potential bad effect on the electoral process. So rather than looking at the bigger picture, with how many groups we have, I think what were looking at now – and I am not going to get into numbers – is a relatively small number of groups, which could however have an impact on the conduct of the elections and in the run up to the elections. This is the priority, groups that could have an impact on the elections. The way the disarmament is going to take place, there again as I just explained, we are looking at something voluntary, which would be through a community-based approach.

Question: Do you think you will start this phase before the Parliamentary Elections?

Senior Public Information Officer: When I am talking about groups more worrying than others because they could have an impact on the elections, I mean groups that need to be engaged before the elections. And the fact that we have this news of this voluntary disarmament taking place on Sunday in Maimana is clearly before the elections.

Question: When the JEMB signed the criteria for the candidates for the Wolesi Jirga, does it mean that the JEMB is not going to change the Electoral Law as demanded by political parties?

Senior Public Information Officer: The JEMB was in a position to take a decision on the nomination of candidates because no matter where we stood with the Electoral Law there were certain areas which were not going to be changed. This allowed the JEMB to take a decision on the nomination of candidates. The process of nomination of candidates is not put in question at all. So whatever the issues with the Electoral Law, this does not have an impact on the process of nomination of candidates.

In addition, some of the requirements for nomination also derive from the Constitution and the JEMB regulations.

Question: There are demands throughout Afghanistan , and in the neighbouring countries that the second round of registration of voters should be conducted. Is there any possibility before the election for this second round?

Senior Public Information Officer: Looking at the posters behind me, they clearly indicate that in the near future there will be the possibility to re-register. Unfortunately no date has been set yet.

Question: Is there any on-going discussion with the JEMB to change some parts of the Electoral Law and the voting system as some of the political parties have suggested?

Senior Public Information Officer: The voting system has been chosen. It is the Single Non-Transferable Vote (SNTV). There are on-going discussions on other issues, those are discussions and exchanges of ideas on other topics. We will wait to know what the final decision is to comment or make any announcement.

[ghostgovt]

http://ap.alaskajournal.com/stories/state/...5/2960135.shtml


Soldier loses left foot after mine explosion in Afghanistan
The Associated Press

ANCHORAGE — A Fort Richardson police officer serving in Operation Enduring Freedom stepped on a land mine in Afghanistan that blew off part of his foot, U.S. Army officials said.

Staff Sgt. Justin L. Shellhammer, 26, was injured April 5. He had been in Afghanistan less than two weeks.

Shellhammer, originally from Tiffin, Ohio, has been in the Army for five years and stationed at Fort Richardson since July. He is the 12th soldier from the post to be injured in combat in Iraq or Afghanistan, Canterbury said. The other 11 soldiers were part of the 900-soldier unit Task Force 1-501 Airborne, which was deployed to Afghanistan between October 2003 and August 2004.

[Marine]

Source: Armada Espanola
Date: 15 April, 2005
LA COMISIÓN APOSENTADORA DE LAS FUERZAS ARMADAS ESPAÑOLAS YA SE ENCUENTRA EN HERAT (AFGANISTÁN)

Las operaciones de apoyo a la fuerza internacional de seguridad comenzarán a mediados de junio

El coronel del Ejército del Aire D. Guillermo Vaya Cañellas y su equipo avanzado se encuentran ya en el aeropuerto de Herat a donde llegaron en un avión “Hércules” español del destacamento de la base de Manas (Kirguistán). La misión de estos oficiales consiste en organizar la estructura de mando de la nueva base.

La base de Herat deberá ser capaz a partir de mediados de junio de dar apoyo al personal de ISAF repartido en las distintas provincias del oeste del país para facilitar el desarrollo de la región. En total serán cuatro equipos de reconstrucción provincial, uno español, en la provincia de Badghis, y otros tres con personal italiano, lituano y norteamericano.

La construcción de la base se inició hace un mes en una zona adyacente al aeropuerto de Herat. Una unidad de ingenieros italiana supervisa los trabajos de la empresa que se encarga de convertir un terreno abandonado en un campamento capaz de albergar a más de seiscientos militares. Cerca de doscientos italianos trabajarán codo con codo con los más de cuatrocientos militares españoles.

La base contará con un hospital de campaña y una unidad de helicópteros de evacuación médica del Ejército del Aire español. Otra unidad de helicópteros dará apoyo a la compañía de reacción rápida (QRF) del Ejército de tierra que operará desde allí. El escuadrón de apoyo al despliegue aéreo del Ejército del Aire (EADA) dará protección a la base y apoyo a los vuelos que transporten carga o personal desde territorio nacional. Otros militares de diversas unidades se encargarán del mando, comunicaciones, y otros servicios necesarios.

El coronel Vayá tomará el mando oficialmente el próximo día 1 de mayo pasando a formar parte de las fuerzas de ISAF, que la OTAN tiene desplegadas en el país para contribuir a la seguridad y asistencia al nuevo gobierno democrático del presidente Karzai.

[wliberty]

Kabul has about 50,000 children working on its streets.
Many lost their parents during Afghanistan's 24-year conflict and they are often to be seen banded together and scavenging through rubbish.
They often show the tell-tale, disfiguring scars of the parasite Leishmaniasis, which lays its eggs under the skin of those who live on the streets. As well as sexual abuse and domestic violence, children at the centre have often suffered high levels of psychological trauma during the wars.

Today children at the centre are still engaged in classes in art, music, dance, computing, sport and basic literacy.

Afghanistan's internationally renowned charity for street children, Aschiana, survived the Afghan wars of the 1990s and the Taleban era. It is the victim of rocketing rents and land prices rather than artillery.

A small class of wealthy Afghan entrepreneurs and international companies have been the prime beneficiaries of the boom.

Looks as though Bush's form of the democracy is spreading. The rich get richer at the expense of the poor and downtrodden. It's even sadder when those poor and downtrodden are kids.

This post has been edited by wliberty: Apr 16 2005, 07:55 AM

[Marine]

Source: UNICEF
Date: 18 March, 2005
UNICEF helps Afghanistan get ready for new school year

18 March 2005 – As more than 4 million Afghan children prepare to return to school from next week after a particularly harsh winter, the United Nations Children’s (UNICEF) has been helping the Ministry of Education to provide basic classroom stationery and materials to schools nationwide.

Although the difficult weather delayed distribution of some materials en route from Pakistan and classroom kits destined for northern provinces, tens of thousands of student kits have been prepared for more than 2 million children, containing materials such as exercise books, pens, pencils and other stationery.

Full distribution to an estimated 4.3 million children is expected to be completed by mid-April.

Underscoring Afghanistan’s major progress in managing its education sector, UNICEF noted that the ministry’s logistics centre – managed by the agency in 2002 – now has full responsibility for packing and distributing the kits. At present it is producing 5,000 student and teacher stationery kits per day.

This year, students in Grades 1 and 4 will also benefit from new textbooks, developed in a partnership between the Government, UNICEF and Columbia University’s Teachers College. The new textbooks are more student-focused and relevant to the new Afghanistan, according to UNICEF, and mark a notable improvement in the quality of education delivery.

While some 1.2 million girls have enrolled in Afghanistan’s primary schools since 2002, more than 1 million primary school age girls are still not attending classes. In addition to the support being provided for classroom materials and curriculum development, UNICEF and the Ministry of Education are focusing efforts on developing learning opportunities for girls in communities with no formal school, with the aim of providing education for an additional 500,000 girls in 2005.

[ghostgovt]

 

 

Looks as though Bush's form of the democracy is spreading. The rich get richer at the expense of the poor and downtrodden. It's even sadder when those poor and downtrodden are kids.

Good perception wliberty.... as BushCo pockets their healthy portions of taxpayers monies for their own personal agendas, while many suffer throughout many parts of the world. What is taking place in Afghanistan will also show up more right here in the US. Ever notice how our US media barely covers the poverty in our own country right here? That poverty will grow ever faster, thanks to the corrupt operations of the entire GOP camp.

More quick facts about the kids in Afghanistan below.



http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportI...try=AFGHANISTAN

AFGHANISTAN: New centre for malnourished children in the north

Children under five constitute some 20 percent of the population of 2.5 million people in the five northern Afghan provinces of Balkh, Samangan, Jauzjan, Sar-e Pol and Faryab. These children mostly live in situations defined by poverty, chronic hunger, displacement and violence. A shortage of safe drinking water, as well as poor sanitation and hygiene, add to the already poor health status of many children in Afghanistan. Only 13 per cent of the population has access to safe drinking water, and only 12 per cent has access to adequate sanitation facilities.

“Approximately half of the children in Afghanistan are malnourished,” Tony Naleo, a project officer with UNICEF in Mazar-e Sharif told IRIN. This motivated the agency to establish five TFCs in the provincial headquarters of the northern provinces, which opened at the end of April.

[Marine]

Source: Internationa Herald Tribune
Date: 31 December 2004
Afghan art's post-Taliban return
By Carlotta Gall The New York Times
Friday, December 31, 2004


KABUL The newly repaired National Museum of Afghanistan has opened its first exhibition in 13 years, a display of life-size, pre-Islamic idols smashed by the Taliban three years ago and now painstakingly restored by museum and international experts.

The wooden statues from Nuristan, one of Afghanisan's mountainous northeastern provinces, are an apt subject for an inaugural exhibition. Museum staff had worked hard to hide the collection from looters and Islamic fundamentalists intent on destroying all idols and artistic depictions of the human form. The figures, from what was formerly known as Kafiristan, or Land of the Heathens, are ancestor effigies and animistic and polytheistic gods, representing beliefs and traditions that were practiced there little more than 100 years ago.

"This is part of our culture and we should preserve it," said Fauzia Hamraz, director of the ethnographic collection, who helped piece the statues back together. "Our country is an Islamic country, but displaying these things will not destroy our religion."

The statues, as well as carved doors, pillars and furniture, date from the 18th and 19th centuries. The figures were brought to Kabul by the army of Emir Abdur Rahman, a ruler of Afghanistan who forcibly Islamized Kafiristan in 1896 and renamed it Nuristan, or Land of Light.

The 14 statues that remain stand like silent sentries, with primitive flat faces, large turbans and headdresses, skirts and gaiters, similar to the clothes still worn in Nuristan. Many are warriors, one astride a horse, one armed with an ax and a dagger. Another sits on a throne.



They come from different tribes in Nuristan's high valleys. In addition to the ancestor effigies, others represent the pantheon of gods once worshiped by the local people, said Max Klimburg, director of the Afghan-Austrian Society and an expert on the Kafirs of the Hindu Kush mountain range. One with a moon face, thought to be Disanri, the goddess of goat fertility, sits astride a mountain goat and rests her face between its horns.

There are also elaborate carved wooden bedposts that depict embracing, seated couples with legs entwined. Remarkably, they escaped the attention of the ax-wielding Taliban.

The statues were packed away in the early 1990s as the country threatened to dissolve into civil war after the withdrawal of the occupying Soviet Army. Some were stored in the Ministry of Culture, some in the Kabul Hotel and some in the museum itself, on the western side of Kabul, which came under heavy rocket fire in 1993.

Some pieces looted then are still missing, said Klimburg, who donated a number of his own discoveries from Nuristan to the museum in the 1970s. A large male bust he found in 1971 and temple posts with deity figures acquired by a Kabul museum expedition in 1976 are missing, he said. One figure, an effigy from the Kafirs of the Kalash valley in Chitral, in neighboring Pakistan, was found cut in half at the waist by smugglers who were trying to export it. It was seized by customs at the Kabul airport.

In April 2001, as extremists gained the upper hand in the Taliban government and blew up the giant Buddha statues at Bamiyan, armed men turned on the museum collection. The staff managed to hide the most valuable pieces in old crates, but the larger ones, including the figures from Nuristan and many Buddhist and Kushan statues, were smashed. The wooden figures were splintered with an ax into as many as 20 pieces.

It took more than a month of intense work by staff and a visiting Austrian-Italian wood restorer financed by the Austrian government to reconstruct the figures.

Even the tiniest slivers of wood were salvaged and, where appropriate, a mixture of paint, chalk and glue was used to fill in gaps. The cracks are barely visible now, and the figures look as they did when last on display 13 years ago.

Schoolchildren and youth groups have been among the early visitors to the exhibition. "They ask many questions," Hamraz said. "They ask why the Taliban didn't destroy all the broken pieces."

But that question still haunts her and the staff just three years after the Taliban was removed and peacekeepers of the International Security Assistance Force, known as ISAF, arrived in Kabul.

"As long as ISAF are here, I don't think anything will happen," Hamraz said. "But if they leave, we could have insecurity again and maybe those who did these things would come back again."

[Marine]

Source: Institute for War & Peace
Date: 18 March, 2005
A Day for Women to Shine
Advocates of women’s rights mark International Women’s Day by noting progress while looking ahead to how much still needs to be done.
By Suhaila Muhseni in Kabul (ARR No. 165, 18-Mar-05)

The Intercontinental Hotel in Kabul buzzed with excitement earlier this month as more than 500 men and women, some of the latter stylishly dressed and even a few without the once-obligatory headscarf, marked International Women’s Day.

The highlight of the March 8 event, sponsored by the United Nations Development Fund for Women, UNIFEM, and the ministry of women’s affairs, and funded by the Afghan government along with France, South Korea and Japan, was a rare appearance by Dr Zeenat Karzai, accompanying her husband President Hamed Karzai, who was the keynote speaker.

The president congratulated women all over the world and offered special praise for those in his own country.

“During the past three years women have played key social and political roles,” he said. “They took part in the constitutional Loya Jirga, they voted in record numbers in the presidential elections, they serve as ministers. Girls are returning to school. This is the reality.”

After the March 8 event, women were invited to the Ariana Cinema in the city centre to watch a film – an event that Najiba Sharif, deputy minister of women’s affairs, had been chosen deliberately.

“For the past 25 years, women have not had access to the cinema,” she said. “This may persuade them that it is time to go back to the movies.”

Sharif added that Afghan women have gained a lot of ground since the fall of the Taleban.

“Our women have been through a terrible time; they were covered by the burqa, and the sun was never allowed to touch their faces,” she said. “Now, with the help of God and the international community, we have come out of this phase and we are grateful.”

Afghanistan’s women have never had an easy time. Constrained by cultural traditions that treat them as little more than household chattels, they have been under the control of men for centuries.

But under the Taleban their situation became a lot worse, especially in urban areas, as they were barred from education and jobs, driven back into the home, and forced to wear the all-enveloping burqa on the rare occasions that they were allowed to venture outside.

Since the fall of the Taleban in late 2001, much has changed for the better. As foreign aid and international agencies poured into the country, urban women have thrown off their burqas in large numbers and rejoined the work force.

According to Sharif, there are 35,000 women now employed in the country’s 30 ministries. Three hold key positions. And Habiba Sorabi recently became the first woman to hold the post of governor after she was appointed head of Bamian province by the president.

Torpaikai Nawabi, deputy director of the Afghan Women's Union, said much more progress needs to be made.

“The presence of three women in the cabinet is not enough to guarantee women their rights,” she said. “Over the past three years, all we have gained is the right to leave the house. There has been no serious attention given to women’s role in society.”

Shukria Barakzai, editor of Aina–ye-Zan, a monthly women’s magazine, is also critical of what she sees as the government’s lack of commitment to improving the status of women. “We do not see as many women in the government as we should,” she said. “There is gender discrimination, and women are always given the lowest positions.”

But Barakzai conceded there was much to be thankful for, “Nobody could have predicted three years ago that women would now be working in key positions in the government and in foreign organisations.”

Barakzai told IWPR how the media had played a key role in reshaping women’s lives, adding, “I am very happy that we have women anchors in radio and television all over Afghanistan, even in the most conservative areas.”

Women still face an uphill battle to have their rights accepted.

Fazal Hadi Shinwari, head of the supreme court, and well-known for his conservative views, was recently quoted in the Kabul daily Cheragh as saying, “The freedoms that women in the West have been given under the name of women’s rights should not be imposed on us.” Women in Afghanistan must behave in accordance with the strictures of Islam, he added.

But many Muslim women do not see a conflict between their rights and their religion. Youth Minister Amena Afzali said, “We are impatient to win our rights, the rights that are guaranteed to us by Islam. But in this country, even giving birth to a girl is considered a kind of shame. That is not Islam.”

While the status of women has undeniably improved in the capital and in regional centres, change in the countryside has been slower to come.

“In Paktia, we do not even think that there is a new regime in power,” said Zarmina, 29, who had come from the southern province for medical treatment in the capital. “Everything is the same as during the Taleban.”

Nor is she about to take up the standard for women’s rights in her Pashtun-dominated region. "We are satisfied with the current situation, because we are used to it,” she said. “There is no tradition of women working [outside the home].”

Sayed Bibi Nuristani, head of women’s affairs in eastern Nuristan province, told IWPR that life for women there was a miserable round of farm chores and housework, and no relief was in sight.

"There has been no change in the position of women in Nuristan,” she said. “In large part this is due to the religious prejudice that rules the people.”

[ghostgovt]

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportI...lectRegion=Asia

AFGHANISTAN: Country facing health disaster worse than the tsunami - minister

KABUL, 8 Apr 2005 (IRIN) - As Afghanistan marked World Health Day on Thursday, the country’s health minister, Dr Sayed Mohammad Amin Fatimi, said it was facing a disaster worse than the tsunami that hit Indian Ocean nations late in 2004 and killed more than 300,000 people.

“We are currently being faced with a silent emergency which is heartbreaking and a big tragedy, it is worse than the tsunami disaster,” Fatimi told IRIN in the capital Kabul.

The minister estimates that around 700 children under the age of five die every day in Afghanistan due to preventable diseases and one women dies every 20 minutes due to complications in pregnancy and childbirth.

Lack of resources and trained medical personnel, along with low levels of awareness and cultural factors, were the main reasons for the alarming figures in a country still recovering from nearly three decades of conflict and international isolation.

“Traditionally in rural areas people won’t let women to be checked by male doctors,” he said, adding that of just 3,000 doctors in the entire country, only one in six was female. “We need nearly 10,000 midwives and at the same time up to 10,000 female health workers,” the minister said.

[Marine]

Source: Pajwok Afghan News
Date: 28 March, 2005
American University to run Kabul hospital
28. March 2005, 12:10
By Zarghona Salehi

KABUL (Pajhwok Afghan News) - The American University of Loma Linda, in Southern California is to take over the management of one of Kabul's major hospitals currently operated by the ministry of health, in two months time.

The 350-bed hospital which was built nearly 40 years ago, in the central suburbs of Wazir Akbar Khan will provide a fee-paying service to patients for surgical and orthopedic procedures.

A spokesman for the ministry of health, Abdullah Fahim told Pajhwok Afghan News that the University wants to help Afghanistan improve its health facilities and bring the health care services to good international standards.

"The Loma Linda University wants to carry out healthcare services with good international standards for a fee."

He said the Wazir Akbar Khan Hospital will be turned into a modern, well equipped health care center, where complex surgical procedures like removing kidney stones, treatment of cancer, heart problems and other standard surgery will be carried out.

He said the university will only charge for the actual cost of the operation and will not make any profit.

A man living in Kabul, Ahmas Maoud Amini has kidney stones, and is delighted that he will be able to treat his illness soon.

"This is great news for me because, now I don't have to go to Pakistan for my treatment."

Nureen's mother has been diagnosed with breast cancer and she says she doesn't have anybody else to care for her mother and was planning on going to Pakistan for her treatment.

"I am glad to pay for my mother's treatment, and if it was possible to treat her here in Afghanistan it would be better, "Nureen said.

"I wish the hospital was functional sooner."

However, Mohammad Nader, a worker of the Wazir Akbar Khan Hospital, said it was not helpful to offer a paid service for poor people who can't pay for treatments.

The Wazir Akbar Khan hospital has been a good place for the poor and destitute people to have health care within the capital, and many patients travel miles from the provinces to have treatment here.

"Now Wazir Akbar Khan hospital will be turned into a treatment center for the rich," Nader exclaimed.

Abdullah Fahim said that no official agreement had been signed between the Loma Linda University and the ministry of public health yet, but it is expected that an agreement will be drawn up in two months in order to improve the health service in the country.

[Marine]

Source: USAID
Date: 16 April, 2005
Radio plays promote improved health practices
Broadcasting for Better Health in Afghanistan

The boulani - a potato-filled pastry - is neither warm nor fresh, but the child can’t resist the treat. Flicking flies away, the vendor hands one to the little girl. Later, the child’s mother cautions her against eating food left uncovered for too long. A pregnant mother waits at home while her husband takes their son to be immunized. At the clinic, he learns immunization can protect his wife--and through her, the new baby.

In Afghanistan, where 67% of the total population can neither read nor write and the female illiteracy rate rises to 99% in some provinces, radio is the only effective communications method to raise awareness of health isues. Dr. Amanullah Husseini, Director of Information, Education, and Communication at the Afghan Ministry of Health, uses radio spots with scenarios like these to teach people how to safeguard themselves and their families’ health.


“We want to convey priority health messages in ways that both inform and entertain.”
- Qudsia Hasimi, workshop participant

With forty radio stations broadcasting throughout the country - fifteen of them newly established and an estimated 37% of the population tuning in - radio is a valuable tool to disseminate important health messages. Messages targeting women are especially important in efforts to lower Afghanistan’s high maternal and child mortality rate.

To ensure the continued production of scripts, Husseini joined with USAID to hold a series of “Writing for Radio” workshops in which twenty-eight men and women learned to write and produce stories and plays aimed at changing behaviors and improving health practices. USAID programs support midwifery education and the training of community health workers in Afghanistan.

As part of the program, women Afghan physicians at the workshop advised on effective communication with rural women. As a pre-test, the class made rough recordings of stories selected for broadcast, took them to villages and clinics, played them for a representative target audiences, and then surveyed reactions. Did the story hold the listener’s attention? Prompt any questions? And most importantly, what did the audience learn? Will behaviors change?

At one clinic, women were surprised to learn about the value of breast feeding and that milk, rich in antibodies produced shortly after childbirth, is neither dirty nor harmful but instead helps protect infants from disease. Revised using audience feedback and professionally recorded in both Dari and Pashto complete with music and sound effects, the spots are now distributed for broadcast.

Altogether, three workshops have produced seven 12-15 minute plays, nine stories, and numerous short spots, all using dialogue and Afghan scenarios to convey vital health information. Since the first of the radio plays successfully aired on Radio Afghanistan in August 2003, stations throughout the country have repeatedly broadcast the latest spots and stories, eager for more. Private radio stations will foster continued and expanded production of radio health messages delivered as plays and stories

Ghostgovt's story more than a year old

This post has been edited by Marine: Apr 16 2005, 10:50 AM

[wliberty]

“Traditionally in rural areas people won’t let women to be checked by male doctors,” he said, adding that of just 3,000 doctors in the entire country, only one in six was female. “We need nearly 10,000 midwives and at the same time up to 10,000 female health workers,” the minister said.

This is because of religous beliefs. It is one of the dangers when people ignore the separation of church and state. The main reason the Islamic countries are so oppressed is because they are governed by Islamic law.

Is this what we want in this country? I think it is a real threat with this administration. Do we want to be governed by religous law? Do we want churches dictating our laws? Whose church? I am religous and believe in God. I strongly support separation of church and state. We only need to look around the world to see the dangers when religion rules.

[ghostgovt]

This is because of religous beliefs. It is one of the dangers when people ignore the separation of church and state. The main reason the Islamic countries are so oppressed is because they are governed by Islamic law.

Is this what we want in this country? I think it is a real threat with this administration. Do we want to be governed by religous law?  Do we want churches dictating our laws? Whose church? I am religous and believe in God. I strongly support separation of church and state. We only need to look around the world to see the dangers when religion rules.

It is true that other foreign countries believe in different religions, but it will be virtually impossible to convert their religions and beliefs over to western beliefs and ideas. In ways I wished we could, just so that some of their customs could be changed, but the very presences of our forces and beliefs will only fuel hatred and violence for 100s of years as they would resist such changes. The only way that a country can be converted over to the ideaology of an occupying force would be for most of that country's ppl killed. In some ways I can see BushCo pulling this off... based on a couple other theories. In all likelyhood though, before any of that will happen, I'd say we all will be facing the end.

These lands and religions have been around for many centuries and there's not going to be any outsider stepping in to completely change that around unless many do die from such an effort. Then we have to ask ourselves, what gives us the right to decide who should change their ways and customs. It would be the same if any foreign religion stepped inside this country and tried to change us. We would resist. That's how I feel about BushCo changing our Constitution and Democracy. I will resist!!

The Afghanis needed economic assistance.... guidance... understanding without violence. Yes, that even means the Taliban. They too should had diplomacy offered to them. We should not foget how it was our own CIA and govt intervention who formulated their existance to what it is today. At what point do we deem oursleves as the 'decider' who changes their rules on their land? We can try to diplomatically help their ppl in humane ways, but that has to happen under peaceful and trusting offerings. I know you are on board with that wliberty.

Then... there's the real reason for why we are in Afghanistan also. It's not about making cupcakes either. Eurasia will be the central command post of the new world order.... well... per the neocon's plans. So, remove the real intentions from the equation and what we have left is out of control slaughtering. Hatred is all that grows from this. Thus... Afghanistan in chaos.

[ghostgovt]

http://www.pakistantimes.net/2005/04/17/top9.htm

Attack on Pakistani oil tankers kills one in Afghanistan
Pakistan Times Monitoring Report

KANDAHAR (Afghanistan): A Pakistani drivAfghan army soldiers examine burnt oil tankers in Kandahar, April 17, 2005. er was killed and three others wounded in a rocket attacks on Pakistani oil tankers near Kandahar Air Port on Sunday morning. Five oil tankers have been destroyed during the attack.

Afghan police official Khalid Khan told media that large number of oil tankers was queued near airport to provide fuel to US planes when one tanker blew away followed by the rocket attacks from unknown position. Fire has been erupted after the attacks.

The injured were immediately shifted to hospital. US and Afghan forces cordoned off the area after the attacks but attackers managed to flee.

[Marine]

Source: UNHCR News Stories
Date: 20 April 2005


A delegation from northern Afghanistan tells Afghans in a slum area of Islamabad that they should return and help to rebuild their country.

Afghan delegation tours Pakistan to promote repatriation
ISLAMABAD, April 15 (UNHCR) – A delegation from northern Afghanistan has begun a UNHCR-sponsored tour of all provinces of Pakistan to tell refugees about improving conditions in the areas they fled up to 25 years ago and to hear their continuing concerns about returning.

"The benefit will be that the refugees living here in Pakistan will learn what recent developments have taken place in Afghanistan," said Samiullah Wardak of the Afghan government's Ministry of Rural Development. "On the other hand, our concerned authorities will also get informed about what problems and hardships Afghan refugees go through in Pakistan."

The nine members – including two people from the United Nations in Afghanistan – started their mission in Islamabad on Thursday and will visit areas throughout the country by the time they board a return flight to Kabul on April 28.

The team, the Returns Commission Working Group, was formed nearly three years ago to help remove obstacles in five provinces of Afghanistan where factional rivalries were hindering repatriation.

Since then, they have been trying to resolve problems in the provinces – Balkh, Sar-i-Pul, Jawzjan, Samangan and Faryab – and conveying the results to former residents living in camps for internally displaced people inside Afghanistan or refugees in Iran and Pakistan.

Although some 2.3 million Afghans have returned from Pakistan since 2002 and another 400,000 are forecast to repatriate this year, millions of Afghans remain in exile despite the end of the open warfare that raged in their homeland for more than two decades.

Many of them have established new lives in Pakistan and are reluctant to start over back in Afghanistan. Others, such as the thousands of residents of the slum area on the edge of Islamabad where the delegation went on Thursday, are poor Afghans who want promises of land or shelter before returning.

"If we are assured by the government that there will be land and other shelter facilities available to us once we go back, we are ready to leave even tomorrow," said Mohammad Zalmey, who was attending the session in an open-air mosque beside the mud-track that is the main road.

But the delegation is carrying a firm message: it is time for most Afghans to come back and join in the reconstruction; they will have problems but conditions in the country have improved markedly since the civil war ended with the overthrow of the Taliban in late 2001.

"Whenever you return, your problems may increase manifold – all of those who have returned in the last three years had problems. But they had to start somewhere," said Shujauddin, a representative of the Afghan Department of Refugees and Repatriation.

"Today the international community and other donor agencies are ready to help the Afghan people. This opportunity may not be there forever," he told Afghan men who jammed around the mosque. "You have to make your own decision."

This repatriation season will be the last full year of the current Tripartite Agreement between UNHCR and the governments of Afghanistan and Pakistan, which governs the UNHCR voluntary repatriation programme that assists Afghans wishing to return from Pakistan. It expires next March, but repatriation is mainly during the current April-October period of warm weather in Afghanistan.

The Afghan delegation is pointing that out in an intensive tour that is taking them through the Punjab capital of Lahore, the refugee camp of Mianwalli, the Punjab city of Attock, the North West Frontier Province of Peshawar, the Sindh capital of Karachi and the Balochistan capital of Quetta.

While any Afghan's decision to return to Afghanistan is voluntary and UNHCR is discussing with the government how to manage those Afghans who remain after the Tripartite Agreement expires, the UN refugee agency and the Pakistani government still believe repatriation is the best option for most people.

That is especially true for the Afghans who have been living for about two decades in the Katcha Abadi slum area of Islamabad, where the delegation started its work. The government wants to reclaim the land for development and its extended deadline for the residents to leave runs out this year.

The residents have the choice of repatriating to Afghanistan or moving elsewhere in Pakistan, but the team from northern Afghanistan was clear in the belief that they would be better off leaving Islamabad, where they specialize in rubbish collection, and return to their homeland.

"If they do not themselves return and build their homes and cultivate the land, it will remain in ruins forever," said Shujauddin. "Our request is that Afghans in Pakistan should come back now, as the United Nations is assisting them to voluntarily repatriate as well as helping them with their initial needs back in Afghanistan. It is a golden chance they should take advantage of."

[Marine]

The cycle of life has started again in Afghanistan as returnees put their shoulders to the wheel to rebuild their war-torn country.

Return is only the first step on Afghanistan's long road to recovery. UNHCR is helping returnees settle back home with repatriation packages, shelter kits, mine-awareness training and vaccination against diseases.

Slowly but surely, Afghans across the land are reuniting with loved ones, reconstructing homes, going back to school and resuming work. A new phase in their lives has just begun.

[Marine]

Since March 2002, more than 1.5 million Afghan refugees have returned home from Pakistan. Many have come through Takhtabaig registration centre near Peshawar.