Pakistan - Exodus

Pashtun hospitality for 19 adults, 25 children, and four camels
Why Pakistanis open their homes to refugees from the fighting in Swat Valley and Buner.
By Ben Arnoldi - CSM

....Strangers are opening doors to strangers all across the Pakistani communities that lie in walking distance from Swat and Buner, easing the burden on the crowded official refugee camps. Residents say their hospitality traces back to an ancient Islamic practice known as muakhat, as well as pashtunwali, the ethnic code of behavior that in different circumstances has led some Pashtuns to shelter fleeing Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters.

Pakistan's war refugees losing patience
Some say they don't mind being uprooted for now – if the Taliban are ousted for good. The Army says it should clear militants from major towns within days, though rooting them out from rural areas may take months.
By Daud Khattak - CSM

As Pakistan's military operation to clear the Taliban from Swat Valley enters a decisive phase, it's won support from an unlikely group: the residents who had to flee the fighting and whose homes and business may be destroyed when they return.
But that backing is on the decline, as internally displaced persons (IDPs) taking shelter in camps, community centers, and other people's homes, wait in vain for the news of key Taliban leaders being killed or arrested – and as temperatures top 110 degrees F.

In Pakistan, an exodus that is beyond biblical
Locals sell all they have to help millions displaced by battles with the Taliban
By Andrew Buncombe - Independent

The language was already biblical; now the scale of what is happening matches it. The exodus of people forced from their homes in Pakistan's Swat Valley and elsewhere in the country's north-west may be as high as 2.4 million, aid officials say. Around the world, only a handful of war-spoiled countries – Sudan, Iraq, Colombia – have larger numbers of internal refugees. The speed of the displacement at its height – up to 85,000 people a day – was matched only during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. This is now one of the biggest sudden refugee crises the world has ever seen.

Winning the hearts and minds of Pakistan’s displaced
The military must be made to understand the importance of protecting non-combatants.
By Samina Ahmed - Global Post

Winning hearts and minds is decisive in any counter-insurgency operation. As hundreds of thousands of displaced persons flee fighting in Swat, Buner and Dir districts in Pakistan, this single truth should drive the response by the Pakistani state and the international community. In short, how those people are treated will decide if the insurgency-hit zones are saved or lost to the Taliban.

Pakistani Villagers Come to the Aid of Refugees
But Pashtun Code Of Hospitality Also Strains Resources
By Griff Witte - WP

When Khalil ul-Rahman's houseguests arrived in this northwestern Pakistani village, they brought with them the clothes on their backs, two cows and little else.
That was a month ago. Since then, Rahman, a 43-year-old donkey-cart driver, has been solely responsible for sheltering and feeding the 22 distant relatives who have chosen his home as their haven from the fighting that rages between the army and the Taliban in their native district of Dir.

Living like a refugee
For those displaced by Pakistan’s fighting, the camps are a cauldron of despair, corruption, and extremist recruiting.
By Adnan R. Khan - Macleans

.... The situation has reached a critical point. But even as the hundreds of thousands still trapped in Swat beg the army and the Taliban for an opportunity to escape, the estimated 2.4 million who have managed to reach havens like Sheik Yasin are struggling in their own way to survive. This is where the real tragedy of Pakistan is playing out: a tsunami of men, women and children driven from their homes, the largest movement of humanity Pakistan has seen since the turbulence of partition in 1947....