12.2007 - Source: UN High Commissioner for Refugees

Kandahar province: New displacements due to military activities in summer 2006 and April 2007; Faryab province/Maimana: Displacements of ethnic Uzbeks due to military conflicts between 2 political parties ("UNHCR's Eligibility Guidelines for Assessing the International Protection Needs of Afghan Asylum-Seekers") [ID 22923]

"New displacements of population in the south as a result of the military activities in Panjway and Zare Dasht districts of Kandahar province occurred during the summer of 2006. The numbers of these conflict-affected IDPs were initially estimated to be as high as 15,000 persons by provincial authorities, but it has been difficult for UNHCR to obtain accurate and reliable data to confirm these numbers. Aerial bombardments in April 2007 in the Zirkoh area of Shindand also caused a displacement of population. While exact figures of the displacement are unavailable, elders of the area estimate that displacement has affected between 3,000 and 5,000 families. In the northern Region, 144 individuals of Uzbek ethnic origin remain displaced in Maimana city out of a group of 300 families displaced in Faryab province during the summer of 2006 as a result of military conflicts between the followers (local commanders) of two political parties (Junbish and Azadi).

The UN response, coordinated by UNAMA, has been to support the provincial authorities – the Disaster Management Committees – in their humanitarian response, in liaison with the local Provincial Reconstruction Teams. Most of these new IDPs stay with relatives and their return to their places of origin is hindered by ongoing fighting, intimidation and fear of being killed by Taliban insurgents, and destruction of homes and livelihoods."

Document(s): Open document

06.02.2007 - Source: Integrated Regional Information Network

Musa Qala district: Some 8,000 people have fled their homes in southern Helmand province in the last three days due tue the upcoming NATO-offensive against the Taliban; many need urgent assistance, local officials reported ("Thousands of IDPs need urgent assistance - local officials") [ID 18784]

Document(s): Open document

22.09.2003 - Source: Integrated Regional Information Network

Province of Uruzgan: cases of forced displacement or intimidation of civilians by local commanders in the Daikundi district, reported ("Rights abuses and forced displacement in central Oruzgan province") [#16190],  [ID 2287]

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21.09.2003 - Source: ReliefWeb

Koshak valley: some 60 families fled clashes between local commanders in Daikundi area ("Scores of civilians flee fighting in Central Afghanistan, UN refugee agency reports (UN News Service)") [#16164],  [ID 2288]

Document(s): Open document

09.2003 - Source: UN High Commissioner for Refugees

Zusammenstöße zwischen Gruppierungen und Stämmen provozieren Binnenvertreibung von Zivilisten ("Aktualisierte Darstellung der Lage in Afghanistan") [#47150],  [ID 2289]

"Zusammenstöße zwischen Gruppierungen und Stämmen haben Binnenvertreibungen von Zivilisten nach sich gezogen:
In der Provinz Laghman hat ein Konflikt zwischen den Stämmen der Lamano und der Sardakheil zum Tod von acht Zivilisten und zur Vertreibung von 200 Familien geführt; Bezirk Dai Kundi in Uruzgan: Vertreibung im September 2002 nach Bamyan und Kabul; Bezirk Sharistan in Uruzgan, wo der Konflikt zwischen den Fraktionen der Hezb-e-Wahdat/Akbari und der Hezb-e-Wahdat/Khalili zur Vertreibung von Angehörigen der Gruppe sowie von Zivilisten nach Kabul geführt hat (August 2002); Takhar, Baghlan: Vertreibung ethnischer Gujuren nach Kabul und Jalalabad (November 2001 bis April 2002); Samangan: Vertreibung im Oktober 2002 nach Zusammenstößen zwischen Jamiat-e-Islami und Junbesh-e-Milli-Islami; Ghor - Chagcharan: Kämpfe zwischen rivalisierenden Gruppierungen/Stämmen im Juni 2002 führte zur Vertreibung in Richtung Herat; Nuristan (Kamdesh) - anhaltender Konflikt zwischen zwei rivalisierenden Stämmen; Kämpfe in Faizabad (Jawzjan), Qal-I-Shahr (Saripul), Shindand (Herat), Gardez und anderen genannten Regionen führten im Jahr 2002 zu Tötungen von Zivilisten. Zur Vertreibung von Angehörigen der paschtunischen Minderheit aus dem Norden: s.u."

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23.06.2003 - Source: Amnesty International

Forcible return includes measures that, by violating the basic social and economic rights of IDPs, have the effect of forcing people to return ("Out of sight, out of mind: The fate of the Afghan returnees") [#13706],  [ID 2290]

"The main causes of displacement for many of the IDPS appear to have been ongoing protection concerns in their places of origin, and socio-economic motives mainly relating to the five year drought, which affected large parts of Afghanistan between 1997 and 2002, and which is still ongoing in some parts of the south. The authoritative guiding standards on the protection of IDPs, known as the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement and based on human rights and humanitarian law standards and refugee law by analogy, provide that IDPs have “the right to seek safety in another part of the country” and “the right to be protected against forcible return to or resettlement in any place where their life, safety, liberty and/or health would be at risk.”27 Such ‘forcible return’ includes measures that, by violating the basic social and economic rights of IDPs, have the effect of forcing people to return. Amnesty International is concerned that IDPs are being compelled to return to their villages or places of origin because they are unable to find employment and, in some cases, do not have access to food. One result of this is that child labour among IDPs is commonplace. A man in Shaidayee camp told Amnesty International that his family relied on his sons, aged between three and a half and 12, to make carpets for the family’s survival. Where IDPs are dependent on assistance, such as in camps run by national authorities and the international community, the effects of measures which violate basic social and economic rights are more pronounced."

Document(s): Open document

23.06.2003 - Source: Amnesty International

Lack of land leading to renewed displacement ("Out of sight, out of mind: The fate of the Afghan returnees") [#13706],  [ID 2291]

"Another problem related to return to Afghanistan is that of landlessness. In 2002, UNHCR stated that 74.3 percent of returnees do not have farmland to which they can return. A recent report noted in addition, “it may be assumed that a ‘significant’ number of returnees did not own land, surviving as workers, tenants, or sharecroppers in varying degrees of dependency to landowners. They left the country landless and may return landless.” In interviews with returnees and IDPs, Amnesty International was repeatedly confronted with evidence of landless returnees being forced into situations of either destitution or internal displacement. One local NGO told Amnesty International that several returnees in the Bamiyan region had been forced to move into caves in the area as they had no where else to live.

Amnesty International also spoke to returnees in Kabul city who had returned to the city as they owned no land elsewhere in Afghanistan, and hoped to be able to earn a living in the capital. Being unable to afford to rent a room or a house due to spiraling rent prices, however, many have been forced to move into dilapidated buildings or unoccupied land. This was what had happened to Kamaluddin and ten members of his family, who live in one room in the ruined Russian Cultural Centre in Kabul city. “I have no other place to live”, he said, “we sold our land five years ago when we le ft Panjshir to seek refuge in Badakhshan.” The majority of these families in Kabul live under the constant, and increasingly threatening, shadow of eviction by the landowners. Of the returnees Amnesty International interviewed in Kabul, many were squatting on government owned land and had recently been issued with eviction orders. Around 60 returnee families who had moved into the premises of a ruined shoe factory in western Kabul have been evicted by the authorities, forcing them to set up tents on the surrounding hillside.
Landless returnees cannot, in addition, benefit from shelter projects run by various international agencies, including UNHCR, which stipulate that the returnee must either own a title to the land, or be able to get his community to vouch for his ownership of the land before the agency will assist with rebuilding shelter on this land. Obviously, such projects are of no help to the landless. This is the reason one woman, Fariba, is unable to return to her place of origin in the Shomali valley from Kabul city, where she is living in an informal tented settlement on government land. While many international agencies are involved in helping returnees to rebuild their houses in Shomali, Fariba and her family, despite originating from the Shomali valley, are unable to benefit from this assistance and thus to return “home”, as they do not own any land in the valley on which to build a house. A group of 15 Uzbek families returned from Pakistan to Kunduz city in August 2002. Being landless and unable to afford rents in the city, they had set up tents on government land just outside Kunduz, but were forced to move away by villagers who claimed to own the land. They now reside in tents 50 metres away from their original location. Amnesty International has learned that the provincial government plans to redistribute this land to government employees, which will almost inevitably lead to another displacement for these families."

Document(s): Open document