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Escalation Swells Afghan Refugee Ranks

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The New York Times

Published: August 3, 2008

KABUL, Afghanistan - On a piece of barren land on the western edge of this capital, a refugee camp is steadily swelling as families displaced by the heavy bombardment in southern Afghanistan arrive in batches.

The growing numbers reaching Kabul are a sign of the deepening of the conflict between the NATO and U.S. forces and the Taliban in the south, and of the feeling among the population that there will be no end soon.

Families who fled the fighting around their homes in Helmand province one or two years ago and sought temporary shelter around two southern provincial capitals, Lashkar Gah and Kandahar, said they had moved to Kabul because of growing insecurity across the south.

"If there was security in the south, why would we come here?" said Abdullah Khan, 50, who lost his father, uncle and a female relative in the bombing of their home last year.

"We will stay here, even for 10 years, until the bombardment ends."

The U.N. refugee agency has registered 450 families from Helmand province at the camp - about 3,000 people.

But that is only a part of the overall refugee picture.

An estimated 10,000 to 15,000 people have been displaced by the insurgency in the south, but the numbers fluctuate as some have been able to return home when the fighting moves elsewhere.

The International Committee of the Red Cross has warned that the displaced who have reached the cities represent only the tip of the iceberg, and many others are trapped by violence in remote areas without assistance.

Many of the families who have arrived in Kabul have suffered traumatic losses and injuries, and they say that they are pessimistic about the future.

"The Taliban are getting stronger," said Muhammad Younus, a farm worker who abandoned his village after his father, brother and uncle were killed in an airstrike two years ago.

"There were armored vehicles on the hill and they were firing. There was a heavy bombardment, and planes bombed, too," he said.

"They did not differentiate between the guilty and not guilty."

RECENT ATTACKS

•A bus carrying a wedding party hit a road mine in southern Afghanistan on Saturday, killing 10 civilians, a police official said. Provincial police chief Matiullah Khan blamed Taliban militants for planting the explosive in Spin Boldak district of the southern Kandahar province.

•Officials said U.S.-led coalition troops used airstrikes to kill more than a dozen Taliban fighters in southern Afghanistan. The coalition troops were in a joint patrol with Afghan forces when their convoy was struck by a roadside bomb in Uruzgan province on Friday, the coalition said in a statement.

The Associated Press

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