Pakistan’s displaced families need urgent aid

Pakistan’s displaced families need urgent aid from Europe says the US. Families who have fled the conflict in Pakistan's Swat valley need more aid from Muslim and European countries to stave off a humanitarian crisis, the US special envoy urged today.

Pakistan launched an attack last month to clear Taliban militants from Swat. It was a move welcomed by the West worried that nuclear-armed Pakistan was sliding into chaos. Several former Taliban strongholds are now under control, the army said yesterday, adding that Charbagh -, the main town in Swat valley - had been retaken. But about 2.5 million people have been left homeless by the fighting in Swat and other parts of northwest Pakistan. Aid workers estimate that more than half of the homeless are children. "What I can't stress too highly enough is the job is to get them home, and that requires security and assistance from the rest of the world community," US Special envoy Richard Holbrooke told reporters at the Shah Mansoor Camp, northwest of Islamabad.

Refugees stranded in the sweltering heat desperately need proper food. "The size of the problem is just overwhelming. And they do not have enough international assistance by a long shot," Mr Holbrooke said. The US has promised $110m (£67.5m) and hopes to provide an extra $200m (£122m) for families who fled their homes as the Pakistani army battled the Taliban. Holbrooke is due to meet Pakistani leaders, including army chief General Ashfaq Kayani, in Islamabad tomorrow to talk about how to secure and rehabilitate Swat. "The reconstruction phase is going to cost as much as the humanitarian phase," he said

Without the urgently needed funds, the United Nations and its partners will only be able to feed the 2.6 million Pakistanis uprooted from Swat region for the next month or two, it said. Less than half of the $280m (£172m) needed to feed the refugees in Pakistan has come in, the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said. Unless relief, rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts are urgently improved, the army's offensive against the Taliban risks leaving extremists as the ultimate winners, said a new report from the International Crisis Group.

Jalala, one of the largest of the new camps is at full capacity with 11,000 residents and more families needing shelter outside the camp. Many of the families in the camp arrived with few or no possessions. The children are particularly affected by the violence they have fled, say aid workers who are monitoring unaccompanied or orphaned children.

By Hayley Jarvis for SOS Children