Family of slain French worker arrive in Kabul

KABUL, Afghanistan -- The mother and father of a slain French refugee worker made a devastating journey from Paris to the Afghan capital on Wednesday to bid farewell to their daughter, shot in broad daylight over the weekend by suspected Taliban rebels.

With international U.N. refugee agency staffers already evacuating the volatile south and east of the country in the wake of the slaying, news of another attack -- this one a carjacking against a U.N.-affiliated de-mining agency -- shook the aid community.

The parents, brother and sister of Bettina Goislard flew in from Paris to Kabul's ramshackle international airport, greeted on a brisk wintery day by members of the Afghan government, the French embassy and Goislard's grieving colleagues from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

They spent the day with UNHCR staff and later issued a heart-wrenching tribute to their daughter and other humanitarian workers.

"We, the family, are devastated by the pain. We have lost our child, our sister and we know how many people are suffering also from her absence," they said.

"We would like to pay homage to all those who put their lives at risk everyday to serve the noble cause they believe in," the family continued. "The pain we are going through today reminds us that, if we give in to indifference, human values will be lost."

Maki Shinohara, a spokeswoman in Kabul for UNHCR, said the family planned to visit their daughter's body, which is being kept at a base belonging to international peacekeepers in the capital.

"They want to see Bettina for one last time," Shinohara said.

A small funeral for Goislard was planned for today at a cemetery in Kabul, Shinohara said. A larger memorial was to be held Sunday, and Shinohara said UNHCR's assistant high commissioner, Kamel Morjane, would travel from the agency's Geneva headquarters to attend.

Goislard, 29, had worked in Afghanistan for more than a year, and told colleagues that if anything were to happen to her she wished to be buried in Afghanistan.

Her father works at the French Embassy in Baghdad. She was educated in Paris at the Sorbonne and in Cairo, concentrating on Middle Eastern studies.

Goislard's killing sent shock waves through the international community, already facing an increasingly dangerous situation in Afghanistan's largely lawless provinces. There have been a rash of attacks on international aid organizations and the United Nations.

Goislard, however, was the first international U.N. worker to be killed in Afghanistan since the 2001 fall of the Taliban regime.

The U.N. refugee agency on Tuesday pulled all 30 of its international workers out of the volatile south and east and suspended aid to refugees returning from Pakistan. The United Nations has also banned all staff in the country from traveling by road while it reviews the security situation.

Meanwhile, there was another report of violence against a U.N. worker in Ghazni province, where Goislard was killed Sunday. Afghan authorities captured the two gunmen and say they have confessed to the crime and admitted being members of the Taliban.

Armed men carjacked a vehicle Monday belonging to a U.N.-affiliated demining program, abducting the Afghan driver, beating him up and then stealing the vehicle, said Patrick Fruchet, a spokesman for the U.N. Mine Action Center. The Afghan driver managed to walk six miles back to Ghazni to seek medical attention.

Fruchet said the U.N. demining agency had restricted staff movements in the area while it reviews security. Mine clearing is central to the construction of a major road between Kabul and the southern city of Kandahar.