REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, NEW YORK -- The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) has reported that many Pakistani families displaced in Afghanistan are urgently in need of food, a UN spokesperson said here on Monday.

Military operations launched against the militants in Pakistan' s North Waziristan tribal region since June 15 had forced an estimated 95,000 people to flee to Afghanistan's Khost and Paktika provinces, the deputy UN spokesman Farhan Haq told reporters at a daily news briefing.

Many of them had arrived across the border with few possessions and host communities in Afghanistan are struggling to cope with the influx, Haq said, adding the UN agencies and humanitarian partners have scaled up assistance since mid-June.

According to the spokesperson, the World Food Program (WFP) has distributed food rations to 900 families. UNICEF, the World Health Organization (WHO) and partners have vaccinated nearly 25,000 children against polio. WHO has pre-positioned life-saving medication for 25,000 patients and UNHCR has distributed tents to hundreds of families.

However, sanitation, clean drinking water and medical care are in short supply, and although local communities have generously welcomed the displaced, already scarce resources are now reaching capacity, UNHCR reported.

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