Afghanistan. - Forced Migration Online

In 2003, the government began implementing a National Return, Displacement and
Reintegration Strategy, followed by a specific Regional Operation Plan for the internally
displaced in the south. The strategy’s main objective was to find sustainable long term
solutions to the problems faced by the displaced over a period of three years, whilst
continuing to provide assistance and protection.
In April 2004, the MRRD developed a National IDP Plan which encouraged a shift from care
and maintenance to promoting the return of internally displaced to their areas of origin while
ensuring reintegration and co-existence with receiving communities. As part of this plan, the
MRRD launched a national land allocation scheme to benefit landless people including (but
not exclusively) landless returnees. By September 2006, some 300,000 plots of governmental
land had been identified, from which about18,000 plots had been distributed.
In August 2004, the MoRR in partnership with the International Labour Organisation (ILO)
and UNHCR set up the Employment Service Centre to facilitate the returnee population’s
search for work. The Centre is linked to other initiatives and potential employers. Whilst the
Government is making significant steps forward in tackling the issues faced by returnees and
IDPs, its ability to do so is seriously hampered by the fact that it is still highly dependent on
foreign aid.
4.4.2 United Nations
All humanitarian and human rights activities performed by the UN are coordinated by a
central organising body - the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) - whose
purpose is to provide support to the government. UN involvement is presently focused on,
and limited to, Kabul and other major cities. Because of this, and the growing unrest in the
south combined with ongoing drought, NGOs and governments have called for UNAMA’s
coordination capacity to be strengthened and its field of operation enlarged to cover some
rural areas as well. This process is underway and there are now fifteen field offices
throughout the country. This expansion reflects the need to deepen UN presence and to a
lesser extent, to enable coordination with the ISAF-led Provincial Reconstruction Teams
which are now in 25 locations around the country.
UNAMA has eight regional offices and a number of sub-offices. UNAMA aims to engage in
political developments at the national and the sub-national level. But they are also very much
geared towards the development agenda. Humanitarian activities are taken up as required, but
actually play a small role in their overall agenda. The previous focus on
relief/recovery/reconstruction has been reviewed and retagged as the reconstruction and
development pillar. Many aspects which should be managed by the government at the
provincial level are supported by UNAMA, particularly coordination. UNAMA does not
programme for development, although it does assist in humanitarian response in times of
emergency.
UNHCR is the UN organization which is primarily responsible for Afghanistan's internally
displaced with support by the humanitarian arm of UNAMA (under pillar 2). UNHCR’s role
is to support the MRRD in assisting the internally displaced and integrating the needs of
returnees into long-term national development projects. Since 2002, UNHCR has assisted
2.89 million Afghans to return home from Pakistan and over 830,000 Afghans to repatriate
from Iran.
WFP provides a range of relief and recovery activities to IDPs and returnee populations in the
form of gifts of food aid, food-for-work, food-for-training and food-for-education. These
projects are implemented in partnership with the Afghan government and other UN agencies
including UNHCR, UNICEF, as well as Community Development Councils (which have
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