Associated Press

Banda Aceh, March 19:

The United Nations refugee agency has begun scaling back its relief efforts in tsunami-hit Aceh province, an official said today, saying the Indonesian government has yet to say if the organisation will be allowed to participate in long-term rebuilding efforts. UNHCR has about 100 international and local staff working in Aceh province. Since the December 26 disaster that killed over 126,000 in Indonesia, its staff have distributed tents, plastic sheets and blankets to nearly 100,000 survivors. “The UNHCR has not yet been requested to take part in the rehabilitation and reconstruction stage of the operation. We have sought and continue to seek some clarity,” said Gregory Garras, UNHCR’s team leader in Banda Aceh. March 26 was the date set by Jakarta for the withdrawal of agencies involved only in providing food and medicine to leave Aceh. The government announced on Thursday the deadline would be pushed back by up to two months, but it was not enough to satisfy UNHCR.

“Of course we are extremely concerned about the March 26 deadline. It is very difficult to work in a situation of uncertainty,” he added. “We have begun some scaling back of operations,” said Garras. He gave no details and calls to the UNHCR’s Jakarta office went unanswered. If UNHCR does leave, it will come as a blow to survivors, who have been huddling under canvas in makeshift camps for nearly three months. The group had intended to build between 25,000 and 35,000 houses along the west coast of Aceh province for survivors left homeless. Garras said if UNHCR is allowed to remain, it would likely begin in April a pilot project building some 1,000 homes in the village of Kruengsabe.

“We are certainly willing to continue our work here but for us to be able to do that there would have to be some clarity as to whether our expertise would be required and to date that has not happened,” Garras said. “There is no hiding an element of disappointment.” Laura Worsley-Brown, a spokeswoman for Indonesian Welfare Minister Alwi Shihab said. Shihab planned to meet President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to discuss “what the government can do about communicating its future plans.” Worsley-Brown said one of the reasons some in the government see no future role for UNHCR is “because the name of the organisation has ‘refugees’ and technically there are no refugees in Banda Aceh.” The government and aid agencies call the estimated 400,000 survivors of the disaster “internally displaced persons” and almost universally refer to them by the acronym IDPs. Worsley-Brown said “from Minister Shihab’s point of view any organisation that can continue to make a contribution to the reconstruction effort is welcome. UNHCR has put forward several proposals that he has reviewed and he is of the opinion they still have a role to play. It is a matter of communicating that view to other parts of government.”