The largest influx of refugees in a single day since the beginning of the US air strikes on Afghanistan is reported to have crossed into Pakistan. An estimated 3,500 people fled to the Pakistan border yesterday after heavy night-time strikes on targets in and around the city of Kandahar, according to the UN High Commission for Refugees.
UNHCR border monitors said the refugees, mostly women and children, entered Pakistan at the Chaman border in Baluchistan province in the south of the country.
Intense overnight military strikes by the US and Britain on targets in and around Kandahar appeared to have caused panic among residents of the Taliban stronghold in southwest Afghanistan.
UNHCR officials described scenes at the border as chaotic. It was feared that in the chaos some families became separated.
"Many are waiting on the Pakistan side of the border, hoping to find missing family members who fled at the same time," a UNHCR spokesman said.
The UNHCR said 10,000 refugees had arrived in Baluchistan province over the past six days: 2,700 of that figure arrived on Wednesday and Thursday at Chaman.
The UNHCR has warned that up to 1.5 million people may try to flee Afghanistan for neighbouring countries as a result of the airs raids and drought and famine in the country.
Meanwhile, one of the main non-governmental aid groups working in Afghanistan said yesterday that all its offices in the Taliban-held north had been ransacked by the hard-line regime and were now closed.
The Swedish Committee for Afghanistan (SCA), which runs extensive medical and education facilities in the country, said its office in the city of Ghazni, on the road between Kabul and the southern city of Kandahar, had also been closed.
The office in Mazar-i-Sharif, the key northern city now under attack by the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance, was looted and fuel was set ablaze, the SCA said. After some Taliban forces cleared the building, other factions re-occupied it.
In Pul-i-Kumri, a main regional office on the road toward Kabul, SCA guards were beaten, buildings were looted and vehicles stolen, the organisation said.
"Staff have fled for their safety and their actual whereabouts cannot be confirmed," it said.
Country director Sidney Petersson said four-wheel drive vehicles had been stolen from many of its offices.
The SCA said it suspected Taliban officials had used them to flee. Earlier this week the World Food Programme had some of its food supplies taken by the Taliban and MSF also reported the looting of its stores.