- Thousands of Afghans gather at the Chaman border to return.
- Fresh orders issued to repatriate Afghans respectfully and arranged.
- Iran has also deported over 1.5 million Afghans in recent years.
Pakistan issued a new invitation on Friday for Afghans who lived in the southwest to leave the country and triggered thousands to hurry to the border, officials said.
A deportation drive, first launched in 2023, was renewed in April when the government canceled hundreds of thousands of residence permits for Afghans and warned them of arrests if they did not leave.
“We have received directives from the home department to launch a new drive to repatriate all Afghans … in a respectful and orderly way,” Mehar Ullah told a senior official in Quetta, told AFP.
On Friday, “about 4,000 to 5,000 people at the Chaman border” were waiting to return, Habib Bingalzai said, a senior official in Chaman.
Abdul Latif Hakimi, head of refugee registration in Afghanistan’s Kandahar province across the border, said they were aware of an increase in turning Afghans on Friday.
In total, more than a million Afghans have left Pakistan since 2023, including more than 200,000 since April.
The campaign targeted the more than 800,000 Afghans with temporary residence permits, some of which were born in Pakistan or have lived here for decades.
Last year, Pakistan recorded the highest number of deaths as a result of an attack on a decade, and the government often accuses Afghan citizens of having participated in attacks.
Iran has also launched a large -scale deportation campaign of Afghans who have seen more than 1.5 million sent back across the border.
