INTERVIEW - Tajikistan will need help with Afghan refugees - UNHCR

By Roman Kozhevnikov

DUSHANBE (Reuters) - Tajikistan, the only country that willingly accepts refugees from Afghanistan, is going to need more international help as the worsening conflict across the border creates more asylum seekers, a UN official said.

The number of Afghans seeking refuge in impoverished Tajikistan will double this year from 2008 to 5,000, said Ilija Todorovic, the head of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees' (UNHCR) office in Tajikistan.

Afghans who used to seek asylum in Pakistan no longer feel safe as fighting along the border areas increases, Todorovic told Reuters in an interview.

Iran, another neighbour, "is deporting all Afghans, anyone who arrives without proper documents" or stays longer than their permit allows, he said.

"So the only neighbour providing generous refuge is here, Tajikistan," Todorovic said.

"We are planning to increase our assistance... through our own internal mechanisms but also through external funding... so that the necessary international assistance can be brought in to deal with this growing asylum and refugee population," he said.

Violence in Afghanistan is at its worst levels in eight years of war, with more than 100,000 foreign troops in the country fighting a rising Taliban insurgency.

With no clear signs of when the hostilities might end, U.S. President Barack Obama is considering deploying tens of thousands more soldiers to beef up the campaign.