KABUL (SW) – As concerns about the deportation of Afghan immigrants from Pakistan surge, a number of children who have been returned to the country in the last two days say that the forced deportation has put them and their families in a difficult physiological situation.
“After they took my father away, I couldn’t sleep. I’m afraid! I want my father to be released.” These are the words of 10-year-old Bilal, who was deported from Pakistan two days ago along with other members of his family, through the Spinboldak-Chaman border crossing.
Before deporting Bilal’s family to Afghanistan, the Pakistani police arrested his father and he is now in a Pakistani prison. Bilal says that in the last two days, because of his father’s absence, he does not sleep at night because of fear. He adds: “They arrested my father. We came with my mother through Spinboldek. We and our mother did not have food or goods. We came in a bad situation. They gave us clothes and food here in Afghanistan.”
A number of children who have returned to Afghanistan through Torkham and Spinboldek border crossings in the past few days say that they do not have peace of mind because of the forced deportation of their families from Pakistan.
Sahil and Rafiullah, 13 years old and students of the sixth grade, who were deported from Pakistan two days ago with their families and are now staying in temporary camps for returnees in Torkham, say that the distance from education has worried them.
Sahil told Salam Watandar: “We lived and studied in Pakistan for several years, now that we have returned, our studies stopped, and when we returned, they gave us bread and temporary shelter, but we want to have a permanent shelter and study.”
Rafiullah, another one of these children, also says that the Pakistani government has deported him and his family under difficult circumstances. “We studied in Punjab for several years, but they kicked us out with harassment, because we don’t have a permanent home and we are far from studying i am sad.”
At the same time, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the International Organization for Migration and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) have recently announced in a joint statement that they are deeply concerned about the safety of children and families of migrants who have been expelled from Pakistan.
In the statement of these three institutions, it is stated that children in such conditions are likely to face the risk of physical threat, separation from family, distress and fear, and their access to educational services, health care and basic needs such as food and shelter will be severely disturbed.
Despite the demands to stop the forced deportation of illegal Afghan immigrants from Pakistan, Sarfraz Bugti, the minister of interior affairs of this country, defended his country’s decision once again yesterday and said that the caretaker government of Afghanistan has no request not to deport illegal Afghan immigrants from this country.
However, Zabihullah Mujahid, the spokesman of the Islamic Emirate, rejected this claim and said: “Demands were made and we published several announcements. The Pakistani delegation that came to Kabul, the issue was taken seriously with them, and our embassy visited their officials several times and conveyed the issue, and messages were sent through other means as well.”
Pakistan started the process of forcibly deporting illegal Afghan immigrants from the country on Thursday of last week, November 2, and according to the statistics of the Ministry of Immigrants and Returnees, more than 50,000 people have been forcibly deported from the Torkham border crossing alone.
Abdur Rahman Rashid, deputy head of the Ministry of Migrants Affairs, told Salam Watandar: “In the past few days, the process of forced return of migrants has increased and in the past two days, nearly five thousand families from Torkham and nearly three thousand families from Spinboldak have returned to the country. Most of the returnees are children and women.”
Meanwhile, the Save the Children organization also issued a report last Wednesday saying that hundreds of children who return to Afghanistan from Pakistan every day do not have access to food, shelter and other facilities.
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