KABUL, AFGHANISTAN – Families across Afghanistan are facing a worsening crisis driven by displacement, conflict, climate shocks and gender discrimination, Jan Egeland, secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), said during a visit to the country.
In a statement issued on Wednesday, September 9, the NRC said Afghanistan has increasingly faded from the international agenda five years after the Taliban seized power, leaving millions of vulnerable Afghans facing deepening humanitarian needs with limited international attention and support.
“This is my fifth visit to Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover in 2021. Each time I have seen a deepening humanitarian crisis that is hardest for women and girls, that has received only lip service from the Western countries who pledged to ‘never forget them.’ Where is the aid to families who suffer alone and abandoned? Where are the diplomats and envoys who could mobilise desperately needed international support for Afghan families in need, and bring relief to women and girls here?” said Egeland.
Egeland said he had met mothers who had nothing to give their children and were fearful of the coming winter.
“This week I have met with mothers who have nothing to give their children, and who fear the coming winter. Infant malnutrition is soaring, and communities are at rock bottom, with nowhere to turn. Humanitarians have less than a third of the funding needed, forcing organisations to make impossible decisions about who can be helped.”
Afghanistan is also experiencing one of the world’s largest return movements. According to the NRC, around 2.9 million Afghans returned from Pakistan and Iran in 2025, while more than one million people have returned so far in 2026.
The rapid scale of returns has placed additional pressure on communities, housing, livelihoods and already overstretched public services. The NRC said sporadic fighting between Afghanistan and Pakistan has further increased uncertainty for civilians who are already struggling to support themselves.
Egeland said many returnees arrive with almost nothing and receive little or no assistance.
He described families living in extremely basic shelters, in some cases without roofs and using sticks and discarded materials to construct walls.
“When I visited the Iran-Afghanistan border last year, and again this week during my visit to our Community Resource Centre in Kandahar, I met many families who had returned to Afghanistan. They arrive here with almost nothing, and will be met with little or no support,” said Egeland.
The NRC said women and girls across Afghanistan continue to face severe restrictions imposed by the Taliban since 2021, including restrictions on education, employment, freedom of movement and access to basic services.
The organization said the situation is often even more difficult for women and girls returning to Afghanistan, particularly when their families have little or no income and are forced to live in areas where healthcare and education are inaccessible.
The NRC also highlighted the growing scale of malnutrition. It said 3.7 million children in Afghanistan are acutely malnourished, including around one million children suffering from severe acute malnutrition, which can be life-threatening.
Mohammad Ali, a father of six, who returned from Iran and now lives on the outskirts of Herat province, explained, “For the past year that I am back here from Iran, I seldomly got any emergency assistance. I appreciate that [support] but this kind of assistance does not sustain life. I am willing to work but there is no job or [lasting] assistance that can secure mine and my children’s future.”
“Donors are indeed facing competing global priorities, but being here and seeing the way that Afghan civilians are being abandoned is truly shocking,” said Egeland.
The humanitarian crisis is unfolding as international funding for Afghanistan has declined sharply.
According to the NRC, funding available for Afghanistan’s humanitarian response fell by nearly 70 percent, from $3.3 billion in 2022 to $1 billion in 2025.
So far in 2026, only about $500 million has been provided against an estimated $1.7 billion needed for the humanitarian response—roughly 30 percent of the requirement.
The NRC said the worsening humanitarian situation is also being compounded by increasingly frequent natural disasters. It cited last year’s devastating earthquake in eastern Afghanistan, which affected more than 8,000 families across Kunar, Nangarhar and Laghman provinces and left many people without shelter.
Egeland said the international community must do more to prevent Afghan civilians from becoming “invisible.”
“After years of high-cost military interventions, the testimonies I have heard come from communities who have been consigned to oblivion. Where are the diplomats? Where are the international institutions? Those with the experience in providing support in complex settings should be doing far more here.
“These past five years have been a desperate downward spiral: it is vitally important that civilians in Afghanistan do not become invisible.”
