Pakistan plans to deport Afghan refugees back to home country
- by Ramsha-Rizwan
- Jun 10, 2019 18:43
“The government has no plans to extend stay of Afghan refugees in Pakistan,” said Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Information Minister Shaukat Ali Yousafzai . The KP information minister have suggested for the government not making any extension for the Afghan refugees to stay in Pakistan and has urged the centre to finalise the arrangements for the return of these refugees back to the home country.
In his statement he has asked the Afghan nationals to return to their country saying, ”Pakistan has hosted millions of Afghan refugees and treated them like our brothers. We hope that they will return with respect.”
He also asserted that the time has come for these refugees to return to their homeland and that the government hopes for them to take good memories with them.
However,it has been clarified that the decision of the government has not yet been finalised nor the provincial government has been contacted in the regard. Earlier Pakistan urged the global community to take action in the process of return of Afghan refugees back to their homeland.
One of the foreign ministers said, ”It is an irony that Pakistan has been hosting around four million Afghan refugees for the past four decades but the world is not ready to share its burden.”
The minister also said that despite the recent financial crisis,we are making efforts to facilitate the Afghan refugees.
The government is also working on a ‘Refugee Policy’ which will be introduced soon.
Currently Pakistan has been hosting more than a million refugees for 40 years with 1.5 million officially registered Afghan refugees and approximately 1 million more unregistered refugees.However, due to “security concerns” and “increasing political tensions” between Pakistan and Afghanistan in recent times ,there has been a significant increase of refugees returning to Afghanistan. Afghan refugees were initially allowed legal refugee status until December 31 of 2016, after which they would have been required to either leave or be deported back, however their return deadline was extended until March 31, 2017.
Leave a Reply