BBC News Online: World: South Asia

Afghanistan's Pashtuns 'suffer abuses'

Pakistan is the safe haven for the refugees

The United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) says thousands of ethnic minority Pashtuns are being forced from their homes in northern Afghanistan and are now stranded on the border, trying to flee to Pakistan.

The UNHCR is calling for international troops to be deployed to these areas to protect minorities.

According to the UNHCR spokesman in Kabul, Yusuf Hassan, some 20,000 Pashtuns are stranded on the Afghan-Pakistan border trying to flee the country.

Forcibly removed

Mr Hassan says there is evidence of serious violations of human rights.

"They are fleeing because they have been forcibly removed from their land, their homes looted, their women mistreated and they have been threatened with violence and some of the members of their community are killed," he said.

"They fear for their lives and they are fleeing."

Those who have fled their homes are from areas controlled by warlords where the central government has little or no control.

They include parts of the provinces of Baghlan, Balkh, Kunduz and Takhar.

The UNHCR is calling for international peacekeeping troops to be deployed to those parts of Afghanistan where minorities are threatened.

But in other parts of the country the UN refugee agency is preparing to assist more than a million refugees to return to their homes.

Some 5m Afghans are living in refugee camps.

The repatriation programme will begin on 1 March and will include those living in Pakistan and Iran as well as in camps inside Afghanistan.