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New Representative of UNHCR in Pakistan

February 19, 2004

ISLAMABAD, 19 Feb (UNHCR) - The new Representative for the UN Refugee Agency in Pakistan, Guenet Geubre-Christos, has arrived to take up her duties in Islamabad in advance of the 2004 voluntary repatriation programme for Afghan refugees.

Mrs Guebre-Christos, 55, has had a 22-year career with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and prior to her appointment as head of UNHCR operations in Pakistan was Regional Representative with the UNHCR Regional Office for the United States and the Caribbean in Washington.

"I am excited to be taking over as the Representative of UNHCR in Pakistan at this time," said Mrs Guebre-Christos. "Pakistan has been one of the most patient countries in the world, hosting a huge number of refugees for a quarter of a century. And now we are at last nearing a solution to this long-running refugee situation."

Mrs Guebre-Christos, who is an American citizen, had also served as UNHCR representative in Rwanda, Nigeria and Benin. She previously worked with the UN Refugee Agency in Kenya, Senegal, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the UNHCR headquarters in Geneva.

Mrs Guebre-Christos succeeds the previous Representative for Pakistan, Mr Hasim Utkan, who has become UNHCR Regional Representative based in Bangkok.

Although UNHCR provides assistance to refugees from several countries in Pakistan, its main activities are focused on the protection of the Afghan refugees who have left their homeland in successive waves since 1979.

Under a Tripartite Agreement with the governments of Afghanistan and Pakistan, UNHCR is assisting Afghans who wish to return from Pakistan. UNHCR has assisted some 1.9 million Afghans to return from Pakistan in the first two years of the voluntary repatriation programme.

The repatriation programme, which continues this year and in 2005, resumes next month. UNHCR has offered to screen those refugees remaining at the end of the programme to see who still needs the protection of refugee status.

UNHCR estimates there are 1.1 million Afghans still in refugee camps and an unknown but substantial number in other areas of Pakistan. UNHCR and the government of Pakistan are planning to carry out a registration of Afghans in Pakistan this year, which will provide a definitive total.