Escape from War

augustine philip mahiga took over as the united nations high commission for refugees' chief of mission to india three years ago. with war clouds gathering over afghanistan, and a huge exodus of afghans expected, the unhcr finds itself at the centre of a huge crisis. there are already two million afghan refugees in pakistan, one million in iran, and 11,684 afghan (registered) refugees in the capital.it is estimated that 1.5 million afghans are already on the move, and sikh associations have been demanding that the government of india seek a safe passage for afghan refugees of indian origin. mahiga spoke to humra quraishi on the current crisis: for the last several weeks one has been hearing of afghans fleeing their homeland. how many afghans have sought refuge here in india since terrible tuesday? surprisingly, there has been no case of fresh arrivals here. this could be because they have been heading/fleeing towards pakistan and iran. in fact, there have been very few afghan refugee arrivals here in india since the taliban took over in 1996. this is despite reports that hindus and sikhs are being discriminated against by the taliban? there could be two reasons for the indian origin afghans (including sikhs and hindus) not coming here in these recent years. firstly, from 1999 ariana airlines stopped direct flights from kabul to amritsar and this has definitely affected refugee entry into india and now the only way to enter is through the land route via pakistan which makes it very difficult for most people to embark on. fleeing from the northern provinces is again very risky because the terrain is very rough and also the fact that the northern alliance controls that area. when did the majority of the refugees enter india? afghan refugees first came here in the late '70s following soviet intervention in that country and then the second lot came when the najibullah regime fell in 1992 and they continued coming here till about 1995. today the total number of afghan refugees registered with unhcr new delhi is 11,684. a breakdown of this figure according to ethnicity shows that sikhs are 5,405 persons, hindus 3,220, muslims (tajiks) 1,950, muslims (pashtuns) 862 persons, muslims (hazara) 113 persons and others, 134. besides these, about 160 afghan refugees live outside new delhi ^ in panchkula, chandigarh, amritsar, ludhiana, mumbai and pune. how would you compare these figures with those of the afghan refugees in pakistan and iran? there are two million afghan refugees in pakistan and over a million afghan refugees in iran and about 1.5 million are presently on the run, moving towards the borders of the two countries. and don't overlook the fact that even within their own country they are fleeing from towns towards rural areas. so some thousands must be getting internally displaced and to top it all afghanistan has been hit by drought for three years. living in new delhi are afghan refugees who are either ``indian origin afghans'' (hindus and sikhs) or the afghan muslims. what kind of backgrounds do they come from? the hindus and sikhs were doing business in afghanistan whereas the afghan muslim refugees were bureaucrats or were from the military. the indian origin refugees are definitely at an advantage as they do get community support and gurdwaras give assistance to them and so they have adjusted better here whereas there is no apparent support being given to the afghan muslim refugees. most of them are law abiding people and keep to themselves. is it true that many of the muslim afghan refugees faced communal bias during the kargil war and also when the indian airlines flight was hijacked to kandahar? regarding the various biases against the afghan refugees, yes, there wereinstances of such sentiments during the kargil war and also when the plane was hijacked but this is not the general trend. are the afghan refugees, particularly in the capital, living in extremely trying socio-economic conditions? there are about 721 afghans whom we term as evis, that is, extremely vulnerable individuals and the unhcr supports them. in fact, the worst hit are old and single women and also some of those families where the head of the family is either dead or is disabled and the responsibility falls on the woman. in such cases the principal applicant of a family is entitled to rs 1,400, the next three dependents get rs 600 each, the next three rs 450 and if there are any more dependents, then rs 200 each. but all registered refugees are entitled to medical aid and subsidised education for their children. the unhcr funds local ngos ^ the voluntary health association, for instance, for medical assistance to the refugees and the national ymca for educational assistance. recently there have been instances where countries which have acceded to the 1951 geneva convention are not allowing refugees/asylum seekers to enter. is this correct? where a state has acceded to the convention, it is that state's responsibility to abide by its terms and fulfil its international obligations. within the framework of the convention, signatory states have an obligation to admit asylum seekers and establish their refugee status. unfortunately there is no compliance mechanism within the framework of the convention and therefore compliance, to a large extent, depends on the commitment of that state to fulfil its obligations. the unhcr has a supervisory role within the framework of the convention and through advocacy, provision of technical expertise and other relevant methods, attempts to assist governments to fulfil their obligations under the convention. in some countries, where refugee/asylum cases may, under national laws, be adjudicated in the courts, unhcr does at times, intervene in judicial proceedings to provide its views to the court on various related issues. cases may also be taken up by local ngos or other concerned agencies and institutions on behalf of asylum seekers and refugees. in fact, this year, unhcr has launched a series of global consultations with governments under the framework of its executive committee process, to try to get member states to reaffirm their commitment to the convention. under this consultation process, a ministerial level meeting is scheduled to be held in geneva by the end of this year to reaffirm the centrality of the convention in refugee protection. the united states does not seem to be raising the issue of humanitarian assistance to afghan refugees. the unhcr is hopeful that countries in the region which will be impacted by refugee flows from afghanistan under the current situation will be adequately supported by other countries and the international community as a whole to meet the needs of the refugees.