220,000 disaster-related IDPs in Afghanistan in 2022: report

A total of 220,000 internal displacements were recorded in Afghanistan due to disasters in 2022, the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) said in a new report.

Following the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan’s (IEA) take over in August 2021 and the withdrawal of foreign troops, widespread conflict and the number of associated displacements dropped from 723,000 in 2021 to 32,000 in 2022, the report said.

More than 6.6 million people were reported as internally displaced in Afghanistan as of December 2022, two-thirds of them as a result of conflict and violence and a third as a result of disasters. The country has the largest population of IDPs in South Asia, and the second largest worldwide after Syria.

The report also highlighted that 71.1 million people were living internally displaced worldwide at the end of 2022, a 20 percent increase in a year and the highest number ever recorded.

Internal displacement is a global phenomenon, but nearly three-quarters of the world’s internally displaced people (IDPs) live in just 10 countries: Syria, Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Ukraine, Colombia, Ethiopia, Yemen, Nigeria, Somalia and Sudan.