Afghanistan, the slum clearance plan is proceeding despite the frost: many people without shelter and without aid

ROME – Twenty thousand people are currently forced to face the extremely cold temperatures of the Afghan winter, homeless and without basic necessities. It is happening in the province of Badghis, in the north-west of the country, on the border with Turkmenistan. The Taliban have decided to demolish the illegal settlements where many Afghans lived during the war, but at the moment they have not offered housing alternatives to the homeless. He denounces it Norwegian Council for Refugees (NRC), which has launched an appeal to the authorities to stop the evictions until the families have found sustainable solutions. “Many of these people now have no food to feed their children and have no way to keep warm as temperatures drop below zero – said Neil Turner, director of the NRC in Afghanistan – the Badghis authorities have responsibilities towards the population. First of all that of ensuring shelter for the homeless and then that of guaranteeing economic support for those in difficulty,” added Turner.

The context. Decades of wars that have ravaged the country and more recently drought have forced thousands of families to flee their homes in rural Badghis and seek safety and humanitarian support in Qala-e-Naw, the largest city in the area. They therefore settled in the urban periphery, managing to survive thanks to a combination of manual labor and humanitarian assistance. However, the Taliban have decided that these families must return to their homelands and all illegal settlements must be dismantled. But many of these people no longer have a home and their economic conditions are so precarious that they cannot survive in the countryside without help. Data provided by NRC operators in the field tell of about twenty thousand displaced in recent weeks.

The witness. “We put all our possessions on two donkeys and walked from the city to the countryside – said a widow who was evicted from her shack in the city and forced to return to the province of Badghis – it was almost midnight when they evicted us, it was very cold. We lived in Qala-e-Naw for six years and now we are here, with no place to live. Almost all of my six children have fallen ill – she said again – we have nothing to eat and no one can help us. The locals already have their problems.”

The emergency response. Despite months of talks and negotiations with aid workers on the spot, the Taliban authorities have not agreed to achieve slower and more sustainable repatriations. Families were therefore forced to leave quickly, with no one caring whether or not they had anywhere to go. Especially to get through the winter. The Norwegian Council for Refugees it has responded to the emergency by providing humanitarian support in the form of economic grants and basic necessities but it is necessary – underlines the organization – that future evictions are stopped until long-term solutions are found at least for the most vulnerable displaced persons.

The data according to the NRC in Afghanistan. About two million displaced people live in slum-like settlements, relying mainly on humanitarian aid. At Qala-e-Naw, in Badghis province, there were eight settlements housing just under 20,000 people and all of them have now been demolished. Last week the Taliban carried out a sort of survey on the settlements to register the families who will have to receive aid once they return to their homelands, but according to the NRC they did not count the female heads of families, who number 187 in all. leaving believe that they could exclude them from the benefits.

The worst humanitarian crisis in the world. Afghanistan is experiencing one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world. According to the NRC, 28.3 million people will need humanitarian assistance and protection in 2023, up from 24.4 million in 2022 and 18.4 million in 2019. A recent UNDP report finds that the Afghan economy has lost five billion dollars after August 2021 and is still on a declining path. In practice, the country lost in twelve months what it had gained in ten years.