Almost 60,000 individuals have returned to Afghanistan since April. Pakistan has stepped up the mass forced deportation of Afghan migrants and refugees, with almost 60,000 having returned across the border since the beginning of April, the United Nations International Organization for Migration (IOM) reported.
Almost three million Afghans in Pakistan are to be deported following an October announcement by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif of a three-stage plan to repatriate them to their home country. The IOM stated in a Tuesday release that it has helped over one million returnees from Pakistan and Iran.
During the second stage of the plan, the IOM reported a dramatic increase in forced returns. Between April 1 and April 13, almost 60,000 people entered Afghanistan through the Torkham and Spin Boldak crossing points, it said.
“With a new cycle of mass returns underway in Pakistan, needs on the ground are growing quickly – both along the border and in areas of return that are struggling to integrate large numbers of returnees,” the agency’s Afghanistan mission chief, Mihyung Park, said.
In March, Islamabad gave an early April target date to about 800,000 individuals holding Afghan Citizen Cards (ACC) issued by Pakistani officials to vacate the nation.
Families with luggage in hand have packed major border crossings of Torkham to the north and Spin Boldak to the south, reminiscent of the scenes in 2023 when tens of thousands of Afghans escaped deportation threats from Pakistan.
Most of the Afghans have been residing in Pakistan for decades following fleeing consecutive wars in their nation and the Taliban’s regaining power in 2021.
