Afghan

Tom Koenigs

Tom Koenigs of Germany named as senior UN envoy to Afghanistan

27 December 2005
United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has appointed Tom Koenigs, a German national who has served the UN in Kosovo and Guatemala, as the new head of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).
Security Council

Afghanistan's inauguration of new Parliament earns praise from Security Council

21 December 2005
The Security Council has congratulated the people of Afghanistan on the inauguration of their new Parliament, which marked the completion of the political process set in motion four years ago at United Nations-sponsored talks in Bonn, Germany, after the ouster of the Taliban regime.

Afghanistan: UN peacekeeping chief vows to stay the course for next five years

20 December 2005
The United Nations will stay the course over the next five years in helping Afghanistan through its full transition to peace and democracy after decades of war and civil conflict as tenaciously as it has since the fall of the Taliban regime in 2001, the head of the world body’s peacekeeping operations said today.
Afghan children

UNICEF urges Afghanistan's new law-makers to help children

18 December 2005
With an historic new Parliament scheduled to be inaugurated in Afghanistan tomorrow, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) is urging its newly elected members to ensure that children are top of the new assembly's agenda.
Refugee employees at carpet factory before repatriation

UN agency helped nearly half a million Afghans return from Pakistan in 2005

16 December 2005
With the year’s last convoys leaving Pakistan for Afghanistan before winter sets in, over 445,000 Afghans will have returned home from in 2005 under the voluntary repatriation programme of the United Nations refugee agency.

Afghanistan: UN officials hail justice and reconciliation plan to bury past enmity

13 December 2005
Citing lessons from truth commissions in other States seeking to surmount troubled pasts, United Nations officials today hailed the Afghan Government’s adoption of a plan for justice and reconciliation as a “new and very important dimension” for peace in a country torn asunder by 25 years of war and violence and abuses.

UN food aid distributed to ex-fighters and their families in Afghanistan

11 December 2005
Needy ex-fighters and their families in Afghanistan have begun receiving United Nations food packages under an initiative of the country's New Beginning Programme.

More than 440,000 Afghans refugees return from Pakistan in 2005 with UN help

5 December 2005
The United Nations has helped more than 440,000 Afghans to return home from Pakistan in 2005, the highest annual number since 2002, the UN refugee agency said today.