115,458 displaced Swat families have returned home since July 13

October 4th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - The United Nations has revised the assistance for the internally displaced persons (IDPs), who left their homes due to a military operation in Swat and Malakand, by over a million. "The assistance level is above our earlier estimates.

September 1st, 2009 PESHAWAR/KANJU - Pakistani security sources on Tuesday confirmed that they had retrieved the bodies of 41 Taliban militants over the past 24 hours in the Swat Valley, and secured the surrender of 104 extremists from the Kanju region. According to the sources, the killings appeared to be acts of revenge.

August 19th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - A United Nations official on Wednesday said that about 1.3 million Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) have returned to their homes in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province, including the Swat Valley. "The best estimate that we can make now is that approximately 1.3 million displaced people have returned home," Pakistan's UN humanitarian coordinator Martin Mogwanja told a press conference here.

August 8th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Islamabad may be seeing the Pakistani military' operations against the Taliban in Swat as a success, but the "dismal plight" of internally displaced persons (IDPs) and those returning home threatens to squander gains from disrupting the Taliban, a New York Times editorial says. According the opinion by former US State Department official Morton Abramowitz, many IDPs sought shelter with their families or friends, and around 50 percent ended up squatting in schools or staying with strangers.

July 23rd, 2009 Angelina Jolie visits displaced IraqisBAGHDAD — Angelina Jolie on Thursday visited a settlement for displaced Iraqis in northwest Baghdad in her role as a goodwill ambassador for UNHCR. The actor met four families whose members said their children could not go to school and they could not afford to pay for medical treatment, the U.N.

July 20th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Fourteen militants, including three rebel commanders, were killed in fighting with the security forces in northwest Pakistan, officials said Monday. In the past 24 hours to Monday evening, the security forces killed 14 terrorists, including three rebel commanders, in a search operation in the Swat and Malakand districts in northwest Pakistan, the Pakistan Army said in a statement.

July 15th, 2009 Troops kill 6 Taliban in Swat as refugees returnISLAMABAD — Pakistani troops killed six suspected Taliban fighters near the Swat Valley's main city, the army said Wednesday, underscoring the region's fragile security even as refugees displaced by fighting return home. Few details were immediately available on the incident in Kabal town, but the military was planning to take local journalists to the scene to show them the bodies.

July 14th, 2009 PESHAWAR - Amidst fear and confusion, the repatriation of internally displaced persons (IDPs) belonging to Swat and other parts of Malakand division started from Jalozai Camp, Nowshera, and two other camps in Charsadda. However, according to other reports, the volume of the return was very low mainly due to security restrictions.

July 14th, 2009 ABU DHABI - The US has hailed the United Arab Emirates' (UAE) support to the people displaced in the ongoing conflict in Pakistan's restive Swat Valley, WAM news agency has reported. US Ambassador to the UAE Richard G.

July 13th, 2009 JALOZAI CAMP - Many of the thousands displaced by fighting between the military and Taliban in north-western Pakistan began returning Monday to their homes in parts of the Swat Valley. Authorities transported families from tented camps set up in the districts of Nowshera and Charsadda, located close to the Buner district which was overrun by the Taliban in April, prompting a government offensive.

July 12th, 2009 PESHAWAR - The North Western Frontier Government has charted out a three-phased rehabilitation plan for the internally displaced persons (IDPs) of the Swat Valley. Under the first phase beginning Monday, the IDPs from 11 camps will return to the valley, the Dawn quoted NWFP Information Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain, as saying.

July 9th, 2009 Pakistan's Swat refugees to return home next weekISLAMABAD — Pakistan will allow the some 2 million people who fled an army offensive against the Taliban in the Swat Valley area to return home beginning next week, the prime minister announced Thursday, saying the region was now secure and essential services had been restored. The refugees are staying in crowded camps and in homes just south of the northwestern region.

July 9th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - The United Nations (UN) has said that the Pakistan government must ensure the safety and security of all those people who have been displaced due to the military offensive in Swat and Malakand Divisions of the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), before asking them to return to their homes in the valley. The United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator, John Holmes, who arrived here on a four day visit, said displaced people must not be forced to return to their homes, and added that the UN is concerned and trying hard to address the problems of over two million homeless people.

June 4th, 2009 PESHAWAR - The Pakistan Army might be claiming success in its operation in the Swat Valley, but a large number of people, who have been forced to flee the region due to the military operation, have put a question mark over the offensive, saying no key Taliban leader has been nabbed or killed so far. Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), who have fled the valley and have taken refuge in government schools here, are skeptical about the authenticity of the military offensive, The Daily Times reports.

May 12th, 2009 MARDAN - Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz chief Nawaz Sharif has said the Taliban insurgent, who are responsible for the displacement of thousands from the war-torn Swat region, do not deserve any sympathy. Urging everyone to come forward and support internally displaced persons (IDPs), Sharif stated that a handful elements could not destabilize Swat.