Afghanistan is one of the most dangerous countries on the planet, according to the Norwegian Refugee Council. The West needs to rethink its policy towards the region, or risk the situation deteriorating even further.
The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) is calling on the international community to increase its efforts to provide humanitarian aid to the people of Afghanistan and to rethink repatriation policies for refugees in the country. The organisation has created a list of seven reasons why these efforts are needed, highlighting that the situation in the country is going from "bad to worse."
1) The war and terrorism continue mean that millions of people are still be displaced inside the country. The NRC said that 1,200 people per day are forced to leave their homes due to violence. That figure is equivalent to an average of 50 people per hour. In the past two years, one million people have left their homes and been displaced, the organisation said.
2) Afghanistan is currently one of the most dangerous countries in the world. The organisation that said 10 civilians are killed in acts of war or terrorism in the country each day. In a recent attack, on February 25, a motorcycle bomb exploded in a crowded market in the province of Paktika, killing three people, two civilians and a police officer.
3) The situation has worsened due to the large number of refugees who have been forced to return. The NRC said that in the past five years, the country has received 300,000 returning refugees per year.
4) Many refugees who have returned have become internally displaced due to the lack of security and humanitarian aid. According to the NRC, seven out of 10 refugees who return to Afghanistan become internally displaced in their own country due to conflicts and violence. Many of them say they have been forced to flee again, up to three times, since their return.
5) Seventy-five percent of displaced families do not receive any aid. The NRC said that half of the displaced suffer from food insecurity that forces them to ration food and skip meals. In all, "7.4 million people need humanitarian aid," it said. Of those, 3.3 million live in acute suffering, 1.9 million need urgent food aid, 1.6 million need healthcare services, and 1.1. million need water and sewage services.
6) Humanitarian aid workers in Afghanistan are under attack.Last year, 'a total of 17 humanitarian workers were killed and 32 were wounded due to violent attacks," the NRC said. Aid organisations "need added resources for security, local agents and networks that can make their work safer."
7) Efforts in the country until now are at risk of being lost. "If Western countries don't contribute more to security efforts and don't rethink refugee repatriation policies, hundreds of billions spent in the conflict in Afghanistan are at risk of being squandered," the NRC said.