Briefing Paper. Afghans in Pakistan: An Incomplete Transition. September 2012

Transcription

1 Briefing Paper September 2012 Afghans in Pakistan: An Incomplete Transition For more information, please contact: Lynn Yoshikawa Senior Program Manager InterAction th Street, NW Suite 210 Washington, DC Pakistan hosts the largest refugee population, and arguably the most complex and protracted displacement situation, in the world. Despite the return of 6 million Afghans since 2001, over 1.7 million Afghans remain registered as refugees in Pakistan and 1 million more are believed to be living in Pakistan without documentation. Despite major disasters and armed conflict in Pakistan, 83 percent of Afghans residing there have no plans to return to their country, due to the lack of jobs and an uncertain security situation. 1 The latest regional framework, known as the Solutions Strategy for Afghan Refugees (SSAR), does not account for the ongoing insecurity and displacement in Afghanistan, let alone their established social and economic links in Pakistan. UNHCR and other agencies assisting refugees are now in a corner, unable to transition programs to development actors, while facing weary hosts and limited aid budgets. Without a political solution for Afghan refugees, aid agencies have found that there are few opportunities to transition refugee assistance to development actors in a responsible and meaningful manner. Background To examine the successes and challenges of transition in the context of the Afghan refugee situation in Pakistan, InterAction s senior program manager for transition met refugee and host communities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and interviewed 23 representatives from international and national NGOs, UN agencies and donor governments. Staff also conducted a review of relevant literature and program reports. This report is not a comprehensive evaluation of all programs for Afghan refugees, but attempts to highlight some of the achievements and challenges identified by those interviewed and provide some explanatory policy context. For this project, transition is defined as "the period between the immediate humanitarian response to a complex emergency and when long-term development processes are underway; where conflict or disasters may recur; in which basic services provision often transitions from direct delivery by humanitarian agencies to self-sufficient and resilient communities; and a time in which there is much need and attention to strengthening capacity among civil society and national and subnational governments. InterAction s Transition Program is funded by the U.S. Department of State s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM). 1 SAFRON/CCAR and UNHCR, survey of Afghan refugees in Pakistan, unpublished manuscript, 2012.

2 The Afghan refugee situation started with a trickle in 1978, which then became a flood after the Soviet invasion and throughout the 1980s. By 1990, an estimated 3.3 million Afghans were living in 300 refugee villages 2 in Pakistan, in addition to another 3 million seeking safety in Iran. 3 During this period, the U.S. and Pakistan intelligence agencies the CIA and ISI actively supported and funded the militarization of the refugee villages. Refugees were required to register through Afghan political parties, hand-picked by the GoP and linked to armed groups, in order to receive any assistance. The government of Pakistan set up a government agency, the Chief Commissionerate for Afghan Refugees (CCAR) which was partially funded by UNHCR to administer the majority of aid. UNHCR, faced with pressure from the host government and acceptance of the militarized camps by its primary donors, struggled to ensure its impartiality but was unable to separate refugees from armed groups. 4 As a result, the refugee villages were subject to various cross-border attacks from Afghanistan, in which hundreds of Pakistanis civilians and Afghan refugees were killed. 5 This association of Afghan refugees with violence in the border regions continues to exacerbate social tensions with Pakistanis today. With the collapse of both the Soviet Union and its allies in Kabul, and with U.S. political goals in the region met, assistance for refugees and the government of Pakistan declined sharply, along with Pakistan s hospitality toward the refugees. Food rations were eliminated in the refugee villages due to funding cuts, leading to a rapid urbanization of the refugee population, many of whom moved to slums in search of day labor. Those who left the refugee villages were among the poorest and most vulnerable refugees, and lacked adequate livelihoods to support themselves. Despite these demographic shifts, UNHCR did not adjust its assistance accordingly, and assistance remained largely focused on the refugee villages. The U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 led to the last major outflow of Afghan refugees and was followed by UNHCR s largest returnee operation, with over 2 million refugees repatriating in 2002 alone. What was then viewed as a symbol of hope for a peaceful Afghanistan turned into the biggest mistake UNHCR made, according to its representative in Kabul referring to the lack of development aid for refugees to rebuild their lives. 6 Although the data is weak, it is believed that most of those who chose to return were among the poorest refugees living in urban areas, as the population in the refugee villages did not proportionally decrease. As the number of returning refugees declined sharply around 2007, the government of Pakistan increased pressure on the remaining refugees using such tactics as camp closures and immigration raids. Today, the population profile of Afghan refugees has changed, with 60 percent of the refugee population living in urban settings, many migrating beyond the border areas, and two-thirds having never seen their homeland. Afghan refugees consistently cite the lack of security and jobs as the primary obstacles to their return. The average Afghan family of six who fled in the 1980s would now have to support over 40 people on the same piece of land if they owned any land and were able to reclaim it. Afghanistan s primarily rural agriculture-based economy is unable to sustain returning refugees, and the 2014 withdrawal of international forces and cuts to international aid in Afghanistan will significantly deflate a weak economy. 7 The SSAR aims to address previous failures in Afghanistan by ensuring that returning refugees are included in national development plans and in strengthening livelihoods and basic services activities in 48 new sites, but does not account for the country s chronically weak governance 2 UNHCR, State of the World s Refugees, UNHCR spent about $1 billion in assistance to Afghan refugees in Pakistan compared to $150 million for those in Iran, due to the lack of assistance driven by the impasse between the Iranian government and western countries. 4 Schoch, Rudiger, Afghan Refugees in Pakistan during the 1980s: Cold War politics and registration practice, June UNHCR, State of the World s Refugees, Express Tribune, Humanitarian Aid: The biggest mistake UNHCR ever made, December 28, World Bank, Transition in Afghanistan: Looking Beyond 2014, November

3 systems, the lack of land reform and increasing urban migration. Security analysis demonstrates that the eastern region of Afghanistan, where most refugees originate, is the most violent part of the country today. 8 Internal displacement, primarily driven by conflict, has doubled since 2008, while the rate of refugee returns has plummeted by more than 80 percent over the same time period. Policy Frameworks and Key Actors Pakistan has been a relatively generous, if ambivalent, host to the largest and longest-staying refugee population in the world, even though it is not a signatory to the 1951 refugee convention nor the 1967 protocol. Afghans lacked an official legal status in Pakistan until 2007, when the government of Pakistan issued the first Proof of Registration (PoR) cards. Afghans have generally been allowed to travel freely and work in the informal sector, but are often subject to police harassment, detention and extortion, even with the PoR cards. Afghans are only permitted to attend private schools, so education is a luxury for those who cannot access NGO schools in the refugee villages, few of which have secondary schools. While Afghans can access government health facilities, services are poor at best, and often nonexistent in practice. Most locals pay to use private clinics, but many Afghan refugees are too poor to afford the full cost of private healthcare. In the 1980s, the government of Pakistan managed the majority of refugee education and health facilities, but it is now unwilling to regain ownership from NGOs, citing that all refugees must return by the end of 2012 when their PoR cards expire. In contradiction to Islamabad s policy, the provincial governments have asked NGOs to continue refugee programs, as they recognize that the lack of services for refugees will overburden public facilities. The primarily Western donor community s endorsement of the SSAR, which was negotiated by UNHCR, has no mention of asylum in the final communiqué, nor the future of the 1.7 million registered Afghan refugees in Pakistan beyond In early 2012, authorities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province announced that refugees would be arrested or deported if they did not leave the country by May 25 of this year. While this has not been widely enforced, 11 families in Malakand division were driven out of their residences in urban areas to a refugee village, where they are sheltering in a school. UNHCR and various donors continue to press the government of Pakistan to renew the PoR in a timely manner, but observers expect the government of Pakistan to allow the PoR cards to lapse at the end of 2012 to pressure refugees to return, as well as see how much donors pledge toward the SSAR s $1.9 billion programs, which includes increased aid programs for Pakistani host communities. The government of Pakistan has amplified pressure on UNHCR to promote repatriation and this year, UNHCR funded information and legal aid programs focused on returns, opening new repatriation centers and increasing its transport grant for returnees none of which will convince Afghans to return in any significant numbers. 9 Pakistan s government is not a monolithic institution and there are numerous, and at times contradictory, views within and between ministries. With Pakistan s process of decentralizing authority underway, the provincial governments now have some increased power, but they lack the capacity and control over resources and the lines of accountability between the national and provincial governments remain unclear. While the CCAR is the Pakistani government s refugee agency and UNHCR s counterpart, other entities the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the law enforcement and intelligence agencies wield far greater authority in refugee policy. Pakistan s upcoming general elections are also playing into the government s political calculations. According to a senior U.S. government official, extraordinary public fallouts, particularly Pakistan s reaction to the 2011 U.S. operation to find and kill Osama Bin Laden, have left the U.S. and other donors little influence with the government of Pakistan. 8 Afghanistan NGO Safety Office, Quarterly Data Report Q.2, July In recent years, new births among refugees outnumber those who choose to return from Pakistan. 3

4 The U.S. government s security objectives in Pakistan are frequently at odds with humanitarian action. For example, the U.S. government funds Pakistan s military operations in the tribal region, which have displaced over 742,000 people, the majority of whom are not assisted due to a lack of humanitarian funding. 10 In another instance, the CIA s employment of a Pakistani doctor to carry out a fake vaccination campaign to find Osama Bin Laden caused the government of Pakistan to launch a major clamp down on both Pakistani and international NGO staff and activities, 11 including projects with Afghan refugees. 12 PRM, in consultation with the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, prioritized the plight of Afghans in Pakistan and developed strategies to strengthen diplomatic, assistance, and resettlement efforts. As a result, PRM is able to maintain somewhat stable assistance, but the State Department has been unable to coordinate U.S. interagency policy. PRM s attempts to transition its refugee programs to USAID, which has one of the largest funding envelopes in the world, have not succeeded because of limited flexibility and different assistance mechanisms, according to USAID officials in Islamabad. In early 2012, PRM requested that its NGO partners begin shifting their programs, particularly in health and education, to local NGOs or the government despite a lack of alternative funding sources. PRM aimed to prepare their partners and program beneficiaries with a gradual reduction in services rather than an abrupt end. Lacking the basic components to facilitate a responsible transition and in the absence of ownership by the government of Pakistan, PRM has placed the responsibility on NGOs to forge bottom-up solutions. However, as noted widely by NGO staff, there is little chance for programs to succeed in the absence of a political solution for Afghan refugees or a coordinated U.S. government strategy, which ensures that existing or planned USAID programs account for the needs of Afghan refugees and that development partners involved in transitioning programs have access to other resources. UN agencies have made significant progress in establishing joint initiatives, such as the Refugee Affected Host Areas (RAHA). However, many of the projects are short-term capacity-building efforts and involve the refurbishing of clinics and school buildings, rather than sustained support and inputs from the government or other development actors for staff salaries, medicines and equipment. In 2011, UNHCR prioritized the integration of refugee programs into existing UN development programs and signed Memoranda of Understanding with several UN agencies, but its practical implementation has been largely stymied by the Pakistani government s stance against integrating refugee services into the national system, which is viewed as a further step toward naturalization. UNHCR has been forced to backpedal on transitioning programs to other UN agencies and is now trying to maintain basic services in the refugee villages, despite the lack of additional funding and the disconnect with PRM s efforts to transition its NGO-funded projects. In several cases where NGOs did not receive further PRM funding or chose to eliminate specific services in their transition plan, UNHCR is trying to take over the projects but lacks funding. The dynamic political situation in Pakistan and a poorly coordinated transition strategy have created a challenging environment for UNHCR and other agencies assisting refugees. As a result of these factors, UNHCR s operation in Pakistan often lacks coherence and coordination, with its sub-offices in Peshawar and Quetta operating independently of and at times in contradiction to policies from the Islamabad office, leading to confusion among implementing partners and uncertainty for refugees. For example, NGOs noted that UNHCR s Islamabad office instructed them to phase out programs, while its sub-office staff told them to continue services. Many interviewees, including other UN agencies, cited weak communication and dialogue between UNHCR and stakeholders despite 10 UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Humanitarian Bulletin, Pakistan, 1-31 July 2012, Issue Ignatius, David, The threat to global health from the hunt for bin Laden, Washington Post, May 29, One NGO reported that the ISI scrutinized its refugee assistance project and questioned its staff. 4

5 regular meetings. Partners noted that there is little discussion of overall protection and strategic issues that affect refugees and the process of transitioning programs. For example, UNHCR staff only briefed Pakistan s NGO community on the SSAR after the final launch in Geneva and following multiple NGO requests. NGOs also bear responsibility for the lack of coordinated pressure placed on either UNHCR or donors to address the operational challenges they are facing in the transition process. One NGO staff said, As implementing partners, we don t speak out against UNHCR. We ve become their contractors, not partners. The presence of government officials often limits an open dialogue, but UNHCR can and should easily find new platforms to discuss sensitive issues with NGOs. Good Practice in Transitional Programming Given the protracted nature of the Afghan refugee situation, international assistance has largely focused on nonemergency health, education and livelihood assistance in the refugee villages with ongoing capacity-building efforts to facilitate a gradual handover of services to communities and local NGO management. Most NGOs longterm achievements are not well documented due to weak monitoring and evaluation tools, particularly in short-term humanitarian project cycles, which are often focused on outputs and activities rather than impact. One refugee said, it s because of this assistance that we have among our community educated people like doctors, teachers and engineers. This has played a major role in our lives. Making a transition from relief to development in protracted refugee situations, like that of Afghan refugees, 13 is challenging due to political deadlock and continued conflict in the country of origin and restrictive refugee policies by overburdened host countries, which often prevent refugees from being integrated into national development programs and services. Similarly, the Pakistani government s attitude and policy toward Afghans have shifted over the years with geopolitical factors. The Pakistani government s accommodation of Afghans has generally increased with the international community s involvement in the region, as it has often resulted in increased funding for the government of Pakistan. When international attention and assistance dwindles, as it did following the Soviet withdrawal and in the current drawdown of international forces in Afghanistan, Pakistan s hospitality towards Afghans also decreases. The Pakistan context did not provide a suitable environment for transition programs to succeed, given the significant operational and security challenges faced by aid agencies, the lack of policy frameworks that support development actors to engage with Afghan refugee communities, and weak coordination among stakeholders to address some of these challenges. These macro challenges limited the availability of sustainable partners for an effective transition to take place and prohibited aid agencies from considering alternatives to supporting parallel structures. Nonetheless, some programs have had relative success in increasing ownership by the government of Pakistan and other development actors and increasing refugees self-sufficiency. Health One NGO has been successful in handing over several of its PRM-funded health services, which target both refugees and Pakistanis, to the People s Public Health Initiative (PPHI), a quasi-governmental organization. As a development partner, PPHI has been a much more effective health provider than the government health department and has been supported by international donors. According to NGO staff, the handover to PPHI was successful largely because the NGO had already shifted from running stand-alone clinics to fill specific service gaps including the provision of birthing stations, staff, medicines and administrative systems within PPHI s facilities over the 13 UNHCR defines protracted refugee situations as those where refugees have been living in exile for five years or longer with no foreseeable implementation of a durable solutions. 5

6 course of the past decade. This shift in service delivery came about as the refugee population had become increasingly urbanized and integrated with the local population. The long-standing working relationship between the NGO and health facility staff, along with PPHI s willingness to expand its services to the majority Pakistani caseload, allowed the NGO to gradually hand over services. In contrast, NGOs operating stand-alone facilities in refugee villages in rural Balochistan were prevented by both the provincial CCAR and UNHCR offices from discussing a service handover to PPHI and instructed to continue operating. NGO staff said that the CCAR s resistance to transition in this case stems from the Pakistani government s policy against incorporating refugees into national services, as well as the prioritization of the Pakistani population over Afghan refugees if additional resources were to become available. Throughout the decades-long response to Afghan refugees, NGOs have been engaging in capacity-building of their own staff and local NGO staff, many of whom are refugees themselves. One NGO estimated that in the last decade it has worked with refugee communities, it had trained 3,000 health workers, the majority of whom are Afghans. One of its staff returned to Afghanistan to start his own NGO, which is now one of the largest public health organizations in the country. Many NGOs ensured that the Afghan government certified their training so that health workers would qualify to work when they returned home. One NGO supports midwifery training for refugees in Pakistani colleges, which has resulted in many graduates setting up home-based services within their communities while also increasing their income. Outside of one exceptional program that has managed a relatively successful handover to a sustainable development actor, several health clinics have closed or merged with other facilities because of funding cuts. The health program that successfully transitioned to PPHI is unlikely to be replicated in refugee village facilities, where the caseload is dominated by Afghans. While UNHCR has said that it will try to take over some of these facilities, the agency is also facing limited budgets and has been unable to commit to gap-filling for more than a couple months. A UNHCR evaluation of its own health programs in 2003 points to a weak and reactive policy framework, which persists today: Without spelling out what UNHCR s overall policy will be towards the Afghan refugees in Pakistan within the next few years, the current strategy of progressive budget cuts to the health programme does not give a convincing message for the future either to the refugees or the GoP [government of Pakistan]. 14 While NGO health services for refugees are of much better quality than public services, expecting a very weak health system to take on a caseload of hundreds of thousands without more resources would further aggravate relations with host communities and local authorities. No other NGO has been able to successfully engage PPHI or government health departments to fully take over health services in the past year. Given the lack of partners for transition, most agencies have reduced and consolidated services. Many refugees have expressed a willingness to increase the five rupee fee for clinic visits rather than lose access to all services, yet UNHCR failed to implement another of its own recommendations to recover some program costs through user fees: In view of the possible prolongation of the refugee problem, new objectives must be formulated on a strategic level. Cost-recovery should be re-introduced, but in a concerted and professionally administered way, potentially with the help of an external consultant UNHCR and WHO, The Road to Health and the Road to Afghanistan: Joint UNHCR/WHO evaluation of Afghan refugee health and health programmes in Pakistan, April Ibid 6

7 The cost of UNHCR s health programs is relatively low at several dollars per refugee, and with changes to UNHCR s health guidelines and a coordinated plan among partners and refugees, much more could be done to make refugee health facilities more financially viable and reduce dependence on parallel services. For example, UNHCR, with support from the World Health Organization and NGOs, could assess the impact of gradual increases in user fees in refugee health facilities to improve the financial sustainability of programs, while also ensuring that there are no negative impacts to refugees access to basic health services. Education Providing education for Afghan refugees presents a major transition challenge due to the systemic differences in curricula and teacher certifications. NGOs have made gradual developmental progress to meet the evolving needs of refugees and build their capacity in order to hand schools over to communities. A number of lessons from the experience of Afghan refugees in Pakistan have been integrated into the internationally-recognized standards and tools of the Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies. Until the mid-1990s, when major donor cuts to refugee programs took place, Afghan teachers were paid according to the Pakistani government s pay scale. Deeming these costs unsustainable, the support of schools was then handed over to NGOs. NGOs developed a mixed primary education curriculum in the official languages of both Afghanistan and Pakistan, which allowed refugees to continue to Pakistani secondary schools, although most could not afford the school fees. Collectively, NGOs have trained thousands of teachers, the majority refugees, and negotiated with Afghan authorities to recognize student and teacher qualifications to ensure a smooth transition to continue their education or qualify for jobs, if and when they returned to Afghanistan. A local NGO survey of its teachers showed that the majority of those who returned to Afghanistan had found gainful employment. 16 Education programs are extremely vulnerable to budget cuts, as they are not considered lifesaving services on par with health and water provision, but if well-programmed, they can provide livelihood opportunities and help address protection issues. Many education inputs such as school supplies, teacher trainings, and building maintenance have been eliminated in recent years, while others, such as teacher salaries, have been cut due to shrinking budgets. Despite and also because of these cuts, NGOs have worked to socialize Afghan communities on the importance of education, with special attention to the sociocultural sensitivities around girls education. As a result of these efforts, particularly through the establishment of local education committees, hundreds of refugee schools operate by relying on parents contributions of labor, material, and voluntary fees to subsidize their children s education. Donors should recognize that while this community-ownership approach to transition may appear more sustainable, it also often leads to significant decreases in the quality of education and attendance rates due to low teacher salaries and large class sizes. The largest provider of refugee education in Pakistan found that girls enrolment had dropped by 8 percent in 2005 following funding cuts. 17 One NGO had significant success in designing education programs to increase girls enrolment to 67 percent over an 18-year period. While the handover of the program to a Pakistani NGO progressed smoothly, no funding was planned or budgeted for the partner to continue services. According to the local NGO that took over the program, many experienced teachers quit, resulting in increased student dropouts, and no funding was available to train new teachers. 18 The fact that schools continued to operate with minimal resources is an achievement, though this bare bones approach, which does not meet the needs of 16 BEFARe, "Survey Report on Follow-up of BEFARe Teachers in Afghanistan. 17 Ibid. 18 Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies, INEE Minimum Standards Case Study: Responding to Afghan Refugees in Pakistan. 7

8 girls and other vulnerable groups, is far from an ideal solution. For an adequate transition to development to take place, NGOs and donors should ensure the post-handover period includes the continued flow of funding and an extended period for monitoring of programs. Legal Aid Although an estimated 60 percent of registered refugees now live in urban areas, UNHCR and NGO assistance has largely remained focused on the refugee villages because UNHCR did not shift its assistance programs in line with the massive urbanization of refugees in the mid-1990s. The vast majority of Afghans, both those living in refugee villages and urban areas, cite police harassment and extortion as one of their biggest challenges, yet only 30 percent have access to the legal or police support they need. 19 One Afghan said, Refugees are in jail in Peshawar because they didn t pay bribes to the police. The police are extorting, asking for 5,000 to 10,000 rupees, when we travel to other cities for weddings or funerals. One NGO has operated legal aid centers with a local partner for the past 10 years in Balochistan province to provide information and legal advice to both registered and unregistered refugees on issues ranging from access to government schools to PoR cardholders rights to fair rent. Due to the very high number of reports of police harassment, extortion and abuse, staff conduct sensitization trainings with police, judges and jail authorities to ensure that refugees rights are respected. The NGO also set up a protection network of Pakistani volunteers who monitor detention of both registered and unregistered Afghans and are trained to advocate for the release of registered refugees and identify trafficking victims and other vulnerable individuals from local jails. The volunteers undertake jail visits, and as a result of their efforts nearly all detained PoR cardholders they identify are released without a fine or punishment. NGO staff conduct outreach workshops in Afghan and host communities to disseminate relevant information regarding repatriation, PoR status, land issues and domestic violence. This regular community engagement also allows NGO staff to identify vulnerable individuals to refer to UNHCR. Despite possible funding cuts to some program components by its donors, the NGO is planning to maintain the legal aid clinics through its own funding sources. Legal aid programs are challenging to transition to longer-term development actors there is a lack of comparable local structures, given the weak rule of law in Pakistan. Nevertheless, the nature of the program is designed to facilitate a more protective environment in which local authorities and communities recognize refugee rights, allowing refugees to be more self-sufficient in exercising their rights to livelihoods and existing public services, rather than rely on parallel service structures. The use of legal aid is an essential and cost-effective tool in urban settings, where refugees are widely dispersed and where there is often a higher risk of arrest and an increased availability of public services than in rural areas. This legal aid program demonstrated that the knowledge base for refugee rights could be built among Afghan and Pakistani communities, but it struggled with the high turnover of police in Balochistan. By shifting from direct training of police forces on refugee rights to training the trainers of the primary police college, which provides recruits to Balochistan, the NGO was able to indirectly educate more police and increase the sustainability of its trainings. Despite this progress, the NGO assessed that there is still a continued need for its support due to the regular turnover of police trainers, as well as its community visits to address periods of high arrests and the impending expiration of the PoR cards. UNHCR introduced new legal aid activities this 19 SAFRON/CCAR and UNHCR, survey of Afghan refugees in Pakistan, unpublished manuscript

9 year, but these programs are designed to provide information and advice on repatriation and documentation issues refugees may face in Afghanistan. Social Cohesion The tribal areas, where the majority of refugees live, have been traditionally marginalized within Pakistan and the presence of millions of Afghan refugees has taken a significant economic and environmental toll on local communities. While Afghans are widely credited for introducing new markets and skills, the influx in the labor market has lowered the daily wage for the average Pakistani worker. The Afghan refugee presence may have been positive from a macroeconomic perspective, but many ordinary Pakistanis blame Afghans for taking jobs and bringing insecurity to the country. Following the initial wave of refugee returns and the closure of several refugee villages, UN agencies set up the pilot RAHA initiative to respond to some of the development needs in host communities. The five-year RAHA program was split into two components, with UNDP leading on Refugee Affected areas by providing development assistance to local communities which formerly hosted refugee villages, and UNHCR implementing programs to improve relationships between remaining refugee and host communities, known as Hosting Areas. The two programs had significant differences in the implementation modalities and perceived impact, and were funded by different donors. Despite its significant success in bringing a developmental approach to refugee assistance, a UNDP official said that the agency has not been able to target refugees in its other national programs outside of RAHA. UNDP structured its RAHA component on the comparable strengths and needs of government actors and communities. UNDP funded the provincial planning and development departments to administer and oversee the overall program, while UNDP staff, who were co-located in government offices, provided technical assistance to mobilize and support community organizations made up of both Pakistanis and Afghans to select and implement projects. On average, 20 percent of UNDP s RAHA beneficiaries were refugees. To increase the sustainability of the projects, UNDP assisted local organizations to register with the National Rural Support Program and Poverty Alleviation Fund, which are supported by the government of Pakistan and other donors. With its involvement in the implementation, UNDP was able to mitigate against corruption by working directly with communities. In contrast, UNHCR s component of RAHA prioritized quick-impact projects, with few capacity-building and community engagement components. NGOs view these components as essential to bringing refugee and host communities together. According to interviewees, the project approval process was heavily bureaucratic and lacked transparency, particularly in the decision-making processes of the CCAR. As a result, most NGOs that work with refugee communities reported that they were either unwilling or unable to engage in the implementation of projects in host areas. Despite some program successes in transitioning refugee assistance to development, the lack of supporting Pakistani government policy is the fundamental obstacle for agencies to scale up good practice. According to recent experiences of NGOs and UN agencies which have attempted to engage the government of Pakistan and key provincial departments to discuss transitioning programs, authorities are not permitting agencies to systematically support development actors to target refugee communities. The program examples in health and social cohesion were more successful in transitioning to development actors because the beneficiaries were primarily Pakistani. Program managers noted that the co-location of staff within local facilities, such as existing health clinics and Pakistani government planning departments, was essential to fostering relationships and a strong understanding of the administrative and service challenges, as well as allowing for frequent capacity-building efforts with government counterparts. Transitioning programs in refugee villages with their separate services and often remote locations 9

10 where there are few viable development partners or continuation of resources has often translated into, in effect, an exit strategy. Conclusion The situation of Afghans in Pakistan is unquestionably complex and challenging for all stakeholders. Without a political solution, the factors which cause protracted refugee situations uncertainty in the country of origin, donor fatigue and restrictive policies in the host country will only increase for Afghan refugees in the next few years. Despite the macro challenges, UNHCR can and should take concrete steps to improve both internal and external coordination, dialogue and inclusive strategic planning to adapt to the politically volatile context. A common position and programmatic approach among UN agencies, NGOs and donors is essential to supporting an effective transition process that does not compromise the protection of Afghan refugees. Recommendations To UNHCR: Reenergize regular stakeholder dialogues to include discussions on policy approaches and contingency planning at the national and provincial levels to develop a strategy, based on rigorous context and stakeholder analyses, that addresses refugees uncertain legal status and continuing assistance needs; Explore new options linked to donor-sustained incentives, which support local integration and/or temporary stay with migration management tools, including temporary and seasonal work and residence permits for PoR card holders and other Afghans; Adapt UNDP s approach to refugee-affected communities to UNHCR s implementation of the RAHA initiative to the extent possible in order to bring refugee and host communities together and strengthen the link between capacity-building efforts and national development programs; Assess, in partnership with key agencies, the impact of increasing voluntary fees and user fees and, if necessary, revise sector guidelines to increase the financial sustainability of basic services; Ensure that aid programs are adjusted with the movements of refugee populations and apply UNHCR s policy on refugee protection and solutions in urban areas to the context in Pakistan. When necessary and feasible, make strategic shifts in service provision to address the most vulnerable refugees; and Work with the CCAR to improve its transparency and accountability mechanisms, including its implementation of the RAHA initiative. To the U.S. government: Conduct an interagency review of the progress made on the protracted refugee strategy for Afghans in Pakistan to identify new ways of strengthening U.S. diplomacy to address refugees legal status post-2012, ensuring that bilateral and multilateral aid programs in Pakistan and Afghanistan, as well as diplomatic objectives, coherently and impartially address refugees needs; Clearly define transition for NGO programs funded by PRM and ensure that the definition is in line with the aims and strategies of UNHCR, NGOs, other donors and the host government; 10

11 Ensure that there is a range of sustainable and effective development partners to take over parallel programs and that these partners have access to adequate resources to provide services after the handover is completed. In addition, include an extended period of time for NGOs to monitor their partners performance post-handover; and Strengthen monitoring and evaluation tools to account for long-term gains and periodically fund impact evaluations of long-running refugee assistance programs, particularly in protracted displacement situations. To NGOs: Focus as early as possible in the initial humanitarian response on strengthening existing public facilities and embedding staff within local structures to address the needs of refugees to lay the foundation for ownership by local actors and longer-term development. In Pakistan today, this approach to transition will likely only succeed if there is approval by the government of Pakistan and there are additional funds to expand services, given the extremely fragile state of public services; Break new ground in addressing the needs of refugees in urban settings, where there are more opportunities for refugee self-reliance; particularly in expanding legal aid assistance program to shape a protective environment for refugees by improving access to basic services and raising awareness among key law enforcement officials; Assess and document the impact of reduced or eliminated services and those transitioned to partners on refugee and host populations; and Increase coordinated advocacy through the Pakistan Humanitarian Forum and the Humanitarian Country Team to identify operational and strategic gaps and solutions to raise with UNHCR, donors, and when feasible, the government of Pakistan. 11