Thousands of Afghans forced home

By Rodney Joyce

KABUL (Reuters) - Iran has forced 44,000 Afghans home to their war-torn homeland in recent weeks, splitting families in some cases, the United Nations and the Afghan government said on Tuesday, raising fears of a humanitarian crisis.

"There are reports of forced repatriation and there are reports of miserable situations about the families that have been repatriated," chief government spokesman Karim Rahimi said.

"Some family members have been forced to leave, or repatriated, and some are left. This is really a situation that we are concerned about," he said, adding talks were underway with the United Nations and Iran to bring order to the repatriation.

Large numbers of Afghan refugees have been a headache for neighbouring countries for decades.

Almost a million Afghans are registered refugees in Iran.

Pakistan says it has up to 3 million and wants them to go home, saying refugee camps are fertile recruiting grounds for Afghan Taliban insurgents.

The forced repatriation of people classed by Iran as illegal immigrants rather than refugees, is another challenge for Afghanistan.

The country is already struggling with rising violence, rampant corruption and growing disillusionment with the lack of reconstruction after decades of war.