KABUL, 14 January 2009 (IRIN) - Mounting security concerns have forced the Afghan government to stop using health centres across the country in the election process, but the use of schools will continue, officials said.

"The president [Hamid Karzai] has ordered the election commission to move all voter registration sites out of hospitals and other health facilities," Abdullah Fahim, a spokesman for the Ministry of Public Health (MoPH), told IRIN in Kabul on 13 January.

Afghanistan plans to hold presidential elections in the second half of 2009 and parliamentary elections in 2010.

Dozens of health facilities, particularly in remote rural areas, have been used as voter registration sites over the past few months despite threats by Taliban insurgents to disrupt the process.

Taliban insurgents attacked a health facility [http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=81071] used as a voter registration centre in Ghazni Province on 20 October, killing one and wounding several others.

At least three health posts used for voter registration in different provinces have been reportedly attacked or set ablaze since November 2008.

Mosques and schools throughout the country have also been utilised by the Independent Election Commission (IEC) for electoral purposes.

"We will continue to use schools. Thus far there have been no attacks on schools used in the election process," Daud Najafi, an official at the IEC, told IRIN.

"Soft targets"

Health facilities have been attacked, medical workers have been killed or kidnapped and polio immunisation campaigns have been repeatedly disrupted by Taliban fighters over the past five years, according to media reports.

Consequently, access to health posts in large swaths of the country, particularly in the volatile south, has diminished and the country's target to wipe out polio by 2006 is yet to be achieved, according to aid workers.

The MoPH's Fahim told IRIN earlier that by July some 400,000 people did not have access to basic health services because of attacks on health personnel and health centres, and also due to lack of security for health workers [http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=79396]

The insurgents often deny attacking health and education facilities, but sometimes justify such deeds in terms of undermining the Afghan government and its international backers.

The Canadian National Post newspaper quoted Qari Yousuf Ahmadi, a purported Taliban spokesman, in November as saying the insurgents were not against health facilities, as long as they obeyed Islamic law.

"If they are here to treat the poor people, we welcome them and support them," he said in an interview. "If they are here for other reasons, we will ban them." [http://www.nationalpost.com/story.html?id=929966]

By attacking "soft targets" such as hospitals and schools, the insurgents aim to discredit the government in the eyes of people for its inability to stop the attackers, experts say.

Denying insurgents a pretext to attack

MoPH officials said that by moving all election-related activities out of health facilities, they were trying to leave the Taliban no excuse to attack them.

"Hospitals and health centres are apolitical facilities and must remain immune from attacks and abuse," said Fahim.

The insurgents' warnings that they would disrupt the election process through armed attacks prompted some in insecure areas to steer clear of health centres where electoral activities were taking place.

"You'll not be able to convince the Taliban that you are visiting those centres for treatment and not for registration or voting," said Najibullah, a resident of Logar Province, 36km southeast of Kabul.

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