However, as the US military’s evacuations are just “cooling down”, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) expressed concerns about the risk of a migration crisis.
The UNHCR's warning came as evacuation and migration operations were continuing in Afghanistan, a 39-million-people country. According to the commissioner, Iran and Pakistan are hosteing 2.2 million Afghan refugees. The UNHCR’s leader Filippo Grandi reiterated a call for borders to remain open and for other countries to share “this humanitarian responsibility” with Afghanistan's “neighbours”.
Many major countries also proposed solutions to stabilise the post-war Afghanistan situation. Russian President’s special representative on Afghanistan, Zamir Kabulov, has just expressed his concern about the situation in Afghanistan while saying Moscow was working to establish relations with Afghanistan's new rulers. Russia on Monday called for an end to the freeze on Afghan central bank reserves. It is known that Kabul held US$9.4 billion in reserve assets, mostly in foreign accounts.
In recent days, millions of Afghans have tried to evacuate to neighbouring countries and to Europe. In an interview published on August 30, Josep Borrell, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, said the EU should provide financial support to countries neighbouring Afghanistan to help them manage the refugees.
In a phone call on August 30, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron stressed the importance of humanitarian assistance and emergency aid to refugees in Afghanistan and in the region through the UN. Around 640 Afghans and their relatives were taken from Kabul to Germany. Currently, many EU and Latin American countries have received or announced their readiness to provide shelter for thousands of Afghan refugees.
In order to share the migrant-burden that has so far been shouldered by countries neighbouring Afghanistan and reduce the risk of a humanitarian crisis, the UN needs the willingness of “sharing the fire” from the above regions. However, in the long run, the best solution for the international community to prevent a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan is to help the country rebuild and gradually integrate into the world, building a peaceful, stable and developed nation.
