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Updated / Saturday, 28 Jan 2017 09:42

The International Monetary Fund has expressed concern over Afghanistan's ability to cope with the massive number of refugees returning home to the war-torn country, an influx only expected to increase.

More than 700,000 Afghans returned home in 2016, the second largest refugee group after Syrians, the Washington-based organisation said in a report yesterday.

An additional 2.5 million refugees and internally displaced people are expected to follow over the next year and a half, which would increase the country's population by 10%, according to the report.

"This is seriously aggravating the government's capacity to absorb refugees in an already difficult environment of high unemployment and internally displaced people after decades of conflict," it said.

With daily battles between government forces and Taliban insurgents, the number of people who have fled their homes for safer parts of Afghanistan has hit a record high.

According to a recent UN report, more than half a million Afghans were internally displaced by fighting last year.

The United Nations last week launched a $550mhumanitarian appeal for Afghanistan saying about a third of the population was in need of assistance this year, a 13%jump from last year.

After 15 years and tens of billions of dollars in foreign aid, Afghanistan is still dangerously unstable and persistently at the bottom of almost every major human development index.

Sean Whelan: Leprechauns on a plane

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IMF concerned over Afghanistan refugee influx - RTE - RTE.ie

Afghanistan - In response to the recent dramatic increase of Afghans returning home from neighbouring countries, as well as record levels of internal displacement, IOM is launching a new displacement tracking system in Afghanistan to better understand population movements and needs.

The sudden return of more than 600,000 registered refugees and undocumented Afghans from Pakistan, coupled with the conflict-induced displacement of over 623,000 people in 2016, could induce a severe humanitarian crisis. In 2017, a further 1 million Afghans are expected to return from Pakistan and an additional 450,000 people are expected to become internally displaced due to the ongoing conflict. Large-scale returns and intensified conflict, combined with rapid urbanization, have intensified the strain on already overstretched local services.

Further compounding concerns is a lack of clear information on the location and needs of people who have returned from outside Afghanistan or those who have been forced to leave their homes.

There is an urgent need to know where people in vulnerable situations are living and what their needs are, said IOM Afghanistan Chief of Mission Laurence Hart. With a system in place to clearly track these concerns, humanitarian actors and the Government of Afghanistan can deliver assistance and services to the families and communities that need it most.

Drawing on over a decade of experience in tracking vulnerable populations and helping ensure the targeted delivery of aid in Syria, Iraq, South Sudan and other countries facing both conflict and natural disasters, IOM will launch the Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM) in Afghanistan next week.

The Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM) is a system that utilizes a variety of tools and processes to track and monitor population movement during crises. It regularly and systematically captures, processes and disseminates information to provide a better understanding of the movements and evolving needs of vulnerable populations, whether on site or en-route.

The first phase of the DTM in Afghanistan will put a framework in place to track various at risk populations in Nangarhar, Laghman and Kunar provinces. A two-day training on the DTM for provincial team leaders and district focal points from these areas kicked off in Jalalabad on Tuesday, 24 January.

IOM staff working in these provinces will consult with community leaders and elders, national and local authorities and previous registrations and assessments. They will also conduct visits in person to form a comprehensive picture of the estimated number of returnees from abroad, internal movements and needs and conditions at the village, district and provincial levels.

While there is good tracking along the borders, there is little knowledge of the actual final destinations, the villages and neighbourhoods, where people are arriving, said IOM Human Mobility Tracking Expert Vlatko Avramovski. The DTM will deliver this information regularly and accurately.

Data collected under the DTM will be processed, consolidated and shared on a consistent basis with the Government of Afghanistan and other humanitarian actors to flag urgent concerns, facilitate the delivery of assistance and help plan for durable solutions.

Following the successful implementation of first phase, IOM Afghanistan will expand the DTMs coverage to other provinces with significant numbers of returnees.

Funding for the DTM in Afghanistan is provided by the governments of Germany, Japan, Norway and Sweden. Learn more about the DTM worldwide at http://www.globaldtm.info/.

For further information, please contact Matt Graydon in Jalalabad, Email: mgraydon@iom.int, Tel: +93729229129.

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IOM Launches Displacement Tracking in Afghanistan as ... - ReliefWeb - Reliefweb

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Letter to the editor: Sen. John McCain says we should keep spending American cash on Afghanistan. Is he serious?

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Robert Kaul 5:14 p.m. MT Jan. 26, 2017

Sen. John McCain arrives for the Presidential Inauguration of Donald Trump at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 20, 2017.(Photo: SAUL LOEB/AFP)

John McCain criticizes the budget director nominee for wanting or get our troops and spending out of Afghanistan. What is Senator McCains plan? We have been there for nearly 17 years.

Tell us, senator, how much are you willing to spend and how long are you willing to spend it on this useless occupation of a very poor, rural, mostly illiterate Muslim nation?

Robert Kaul,Scottsdale

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Letter: Is McCain serious about Afghanistan? - AZCentral.com

Suzanne Steele recalls a winter where dozens of children in a Kabul refugee camp froze to death.

Embedded with the Canadian Forcesin Afghanistan as Canada's War Poet, Steele wanted to give voice to those children and the countless others who have died due to war in that country.

In thesymphonic piece, Afghanistan: Requiem for a Generation, which is having its Vancouver premiere Friday, Steele attempts to do that with a choir of Langley children.

The music was written by composer Jeffrey Ryan. Steele wrote the words.

"It was extremely important for me that their voices were heard," she told On The Coast's Lisa Christiansen. "If we could rain thousands and thousands of tons of ordinance on the desert, against each other, why can't we rain blankets for these children?"

Steele's requiemis the product of her time as an artist in the war torn nation with the 1st Battalion Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry from 2008 to 2010.

The Vancouver-born Steele says the traditional Catholic song for the dead is the most appropriate way of expressing what she witnessed duringthat time.

The day after Remembrance Day 2010 was when Steele began working on the project with Ryan, the composer,who is also based in Vancouver.

They spent two yearson it, attempting to capture the experiences of soldiers and civilians.

Suzanne Steele (centre) with Canadian soldiers training at CFB Wainwright before deploying to Afghanistan. (warpoet.ca)

"We try to evoke the response after a soldier steps on an [improvised explosive device]," Steele said. "I asked Jeff, could we have SOS in Morse code embedded into? Dit-dit-dit-daht-daht-daht-dit-dit-dit."

Ryan says the hour-long requiem, performed with a children's choir, an adult choir, four soloists and an orchestra in four languages English, French, Latin and Pashtun was challenging to put together.

But it's also important, he says, especially because of its timing.

"It's [about] 100 years since World War I, the war that supposed to end all wars," he said. "I think it's really important to remind everyone these things are still happening, that 'the war to end all wars' didn't end all wars.

"What are we going to do about that?"

With files from CBC Radio One's On The Coast

War poet Suzanne Steele (left) and composer Jeffrey Ryan are the collaborators behind Afghanistan: Requiem for a Generation. (Lisa Christiansen/CBC)

To hear the full story, click the audio labelled:Canadian war poet tells story of Afghanistan in requiem with VSO

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Canadian war poet tells story of Afghanistan in requiem with VSO - CBC.ca

January 26, 2017 6:35 PM By Derrick Blakley

(CBS) President Trump was in Philadelphia today following his first interview with ABC News, where he took another swipe at Chicago crime.

Its horrible carnage. This isAfghanistan is not like whats happening in Chicago. People are being shot left and right, he said.

CBS 2s Derrick Blakley reports.

Chicago civic leaders at the City Club disputed the presidents dire view.

Chicago is not Afghanistan. It does make a good tweet, said Urban League CEO Shari Runner.

It does make good media play. But the city is not a war zone and we should not treat it as such, she added.

But city club speakers dont want to sugarcoat Chicagos homicide problem. The city has seen a 58% spike in murders from 2016.

Jens Ludwig of the University of Chicago Crime lab said his group looked at data from the five largest cities in the US in the past 25 years.

Not a single city has experienced a change of this size, he said.

President Trump thinks the violence problem can be fixed by getting tougher and stronger and smarter.

In response to getting tougher on crime, Chicago Police Department Patrol Chief Fred Waller cracked a joke about the absence of his boss, Eddie Johnson, saying hes back at headquarters opening the waterboarding kit that Washington sent us.

Congresswoman Robin Kelly has already gone directly to the top, inviting the new president to her district.

Hes talking about carnage and this, that and the other. Let him meet some of the people, let him see whats going on, she said.

According to Ludwig, a quarter of Chicagos murder suspects are under age 19, which is far higher than other cities.

This means mentoring programs, like those promoted by Mayor Emanuel, could make an impact.

Three quarters of murder suspects are young adults as well, meaning better education, job training and access to actual jobs could benefit them.

Derrick Blakley is a general assignment reporter for CBS 2 Chicago. Send An E-Mail To Derrick Blakley In June 2003, Blakley returned to CBS after 15 years at NBC 5 Chicago. Previously, he had worked for CBS News for seven years, based in...

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Chicago Leaders Fire Back At Trump's Afghanistan Reference - CBS Local