ISLAMABAD (SW) – With each passing day, Afghan refugees in Pakistan are losing hopes for a way out of the hardships and legal hassles.
Ghafoor, one of the Afghan refugees in Pakistan, said that while Afghan citizens in Pakistan are facing economic and social problems, the threat of arrest and pressure from the Pakistani government has caused serious concern for them.
He told Salam Watandar: “We are facing problems, we don’t know what to do? We dragged ourselves this far and now we don’t know where to go and what to do after these pressures?”
Meanwhile, a number of Afghan immigrants in Pakistan say that most of the immigrants who came to Pakistan after the collapse of the republic entered the country without a visa, and those who came with a visa, it is not easy for them to extend it.
According to them, this situation has exposed most Afghan immigrants in Pakistan to arrest and imprisonment or deportation.
Ahmad, another Afghan immigrant in Pakistan, said: “We want them to treat the immigrants well, and the fate of the immigrants who are in Pakistan should be known, and this deadline set by Pakistan should be taken into account.”
Just recently, Agnes Kalamar, the Secretary General of Amnesty International, sent an open letter to Shahbaz Sharif, the Prime Minister of Pakistan, expressing her concern about the situation of Afghan refugees in this country and the discriminatory treatment they face. She asked the Pakistani government to facilitate the refugees’ right to education and work and start a regular process to grant residence and resolve the problem of visa extension.
A number of Afghan refugees in Pakistan say that they have filed many lawsuits to resolve these challenges, but so far, they have not received a satisfactory response from the international organizations and the government of Pakistan.
Najibullah Habibi, an Afghan journalist based in Pakistan, told Salam Watandar: “The government of Pakistan blames the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees for a series of problems, but we contacted the spokesperson of this organization several times who said that the Pakistani government does not want to distribute residency cards to immigrants so that they have legal documents.”
On the other hand, Afghans who have returned from Pakistan also complain about the inappropriate treatment of Pakistani security forces with Afghan citizens.
Janat Gul, who recently returned from Pakistan, says: “We were arrested and imprisoned, and they tortured us severely in prison, and the effects of torture still remain.”
It should be mentioned that a few days ago, a delegation from the Islamic Emirate went to Tehran to participate in a quadrilateral meeting to examine the situation of Afghan refugees in Iran and Pakistan. But the details of this meeting have not been shared with the media yet.
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