The Taliban, who control the vast bulk of Afghanistan's territory, are responsible for massacres, summary executions, and torture, as well as massive violations of women's human rights. But uprooted Afghans find no certain refuge. The U.N. agency charged with protecting Afghan refugees has had to scale back its programs due to a lack of donor support. Among rich Western countries, refugee fatigue is the order of the day. Nor are neighboring countries any more willing to shoulder the burden of refugee protection.
Afghan refugees live in squalor in Pakistani camps, dying daily of dehydration and heat stroke.
The Jalozai camp, a particularly horrid hell hole in northwest Pakistan, holds some 80,000 Afghans in conditions of extreme deprivation. Pakistan has barred the U.N. refugee agency from registering people in the camps, a precondition for the widespread distribution of aid. Nor have the Pakistani authorities allowed the U.N. to move the refugees to a more suitable location. Because they border on Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran have been the two major recipients of Afghan refugee flows. Each now gives refuge to well over a million Afghans.