Afghan refugees in Pakistan number some three million. Most crossed the border in 1979 during the Soviet invasion and have lived in Pakistan for generations. Credit: Ashfaq Yusufzai/IPS

By Ashfaq Yusufzai
PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Jan 1 2015 (IPS)

They number between two and three million; some have lived in makeshift shelters for just a few months, while others have roots that stretch much further back into history. Most fled to escape war, others simply ran away from joblessness.

Whatever their reasons for being here, Afghan refugees in Pakistan all now face a similar plight: of being caught up in the dragnet that is sweeping through the country with the stated goal of removing ‘illegal’ residents from this South Asian nation of 180 million people.

According to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), some 1.6 million Afghans are legally residing in Pakistan, having been granted proof of registration (PoR) by the U.N. body. Twice that number is believed to be unlawfully dwelling here, primarily in the northern, tribal belt that borders Afghanistan.

“Forced repatriation will expose us to many problems." -- Gul Jamal, an elderly Afghan refugee in Peshawar, Pakistan
Most arrived during the Soviet invasion of 1979, the chaos of war squeezing millions of Afghans out of their embattled nation and over the mountainous border that stretches for some 2,700 km along rocky terrain.

The Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and what was then known as the North-West Frontier Province, now called Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), offered an easy point of assimilation, the shared language of Pashto bridging the divide between ethnic Pashtun Afghans and the majority Punjabi population.

But what began as a warm welcome has turned progressively sour over the decades, as Afghans are increasingly blamed for rising crime, unemployment and persistent militancy in the region.

The Dec. 16 terrorist attack on a school in the KP’s capital Peshawar – which killed 132 children – has only added fuel to a fiery debate on the status of Afghan refugees, who are accused of swelling the ranks of the Pakistani Taliban and affiliated militant groups operating with impunity in the tribal areas.

Three days after the massacre, on Dec. 19, KP Chief Minister Pervez Khattak convened an emergency cabinet meeting to demand the immediate removal of all Afghan refugees, claiming that the grisly attack on the Army Public School was planned in Afghanistan.

His call for repatriation joined a chorus that has been growing steadily louder in northern Pakistan as the average citizen struggles to come to terms with an era of terrorism that has resulted in over 50,000 deaths since 2001, when the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan prompted a second wave of immigration into Pakistan.

A heated national debate eventually resulted in a decision to allow lawful Afghan residents to remain in the country until the end of 2015, at which point plans would be made for their safe return.

A previous plan, which followed on the heels of a Peshawar High Court order to repatriate Afghan refugees by the end of 2013, did not see the light of day, largely as it would have entailed over a billion dollars in international assistance.

Afghans own 10,000 of the 20,000 shops in Peshawar, capital of Pakistan’s northern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, and also run a range of informal businesses, such as street stalls where they hawk goods. Credit: Ashfaq Yusufzai/IPS

Tired of waiting for government action, however, local authorities have taken the law into their own hands by embarking on a major crackdown on Afghan refugees.

“About 80 percent of crimes in KP are committed by Afghans,” alleged KP Information Minister Mushtaq Ghani.

“They are involved in murders and kidnapping for ransom, but they disappear after committing these crimes and we cannot trace them,” he told IPS.

“Therefore we demand that those having PoR be restricted to camps, and those without [their papers] sent home,” added the official, whose province is home to an estimated one million Afghans.

Police Officer Khalid Khan says his force is arresting roughly 100 people each day. “Every house is searched,” he told IPS, adding that even those who live in “posh localities” are being investigated as possible unlawful residents.

Terror and crime are not the only problems for which Afghans are being blamed. Trade and industry experts here claim that illegal ventures established by refugee communities have destroyed local businesses.

According to Ghulam Nabi, vice president of the KP Chamber of Commerce and Industries, Afghans run 10,000 of the estimated 20,000 shops in Peshawar; but since they are not registered residents, they are not subject to the same taxes as Pakistani shop-owners.

He told IPS his department has been “urging” the federal government to repatriate Afghans so locals can continue to do their trade. He also alleged that refugees’ demand for housing has pushed rents to unaffordable prices.

Besides hosting hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees, the KP is also saddled with scores of displaced Pakistanis, the most recent influx arriving in the midst of a government military campaign in North Waziristan Agency aimed at rooting out insurgents from their stronghold.

Abdullah Khan, a professor at the University of Peshawar, told IPS that two million displaced Pakistanis from adjacent provinces are now residing in KP, many of them in makeshift ‘tent cities’ erected in the Bannu district.

According to Khan, Afghanistan’s gradual return to democracy has paved the way for safe return for refugees. He, along with other experts and officials, see no further reason for Pakistan to continue to host such a massive international population within its borders – especially with so many domestic issues clamouring to be dealt with.

Former cricket legend Imran Khan, whose Pakistan Tehreek-e Insaf (Pakistan Movement for Justice) party rules the KP province, has also echoed the demand.

“The government issues 500 Pakistani visas to Afghans at the Torkham border [a major crossing point connecting Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province with FATA] everyday but an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 people cross the border daily,” he said on Dec. 18.

“The illegal movement takes place because we don’t have a system to track these people and their activities here,” he added.

In a bid to rectify gaps in the system, police in KP are now blocking cell phones belonging to Afghans and taking steps to regulate the movements of refugees who may be in violation of their visa status.

But many Afghan residents claim the allegations are unfounded, while those who have lived here for generations consider Pakistan their home. Others are simply afraid of what will be waiting for them if they do go back.

Gul Jamal, an Afghan elder, told IPS that while his family was eager to return, the situation back home was “extremely precarious”.

“There are no education or health facilities, and no electricity,” he claimed, adding that job opportunities too are few and far between in Afghanistan.

He hopes the Pakistan government will “take pity” on his people. “Forced repatriation will expose us to many problems,” he explained.

In an interview with IPS on Dec. 22, Federal Minister for States and Frontier Regions Abdul Qadir Baloch categorically stated that legal refugees would stay on until the end of 2015 as per the government’s agreement with UNHCR.

“The registered Afghan refugees have never been found to be involved in terrorism-related incidents in the country and they won’t be sent back against their will,” Baloch stressed.

“The government will protect legal Afghan [immigrants] against forced repatriation,” he asserted.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

Those displaced by a military offensive in northern Pakistan spend hours on the roadside in 45-degree heat. Credit: Ashfaq Yusufzai

By Ashfaq Yusufzai
PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Jun 23 2014 (IPS)

Shaukat Ali, a shopkeeper originally hailing from Miramshah in the Northern Waziristan Agency of Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), looks exhausted as he sits outside a makeshift shelter with his family of 10.

They traveled for a whole day to reach this tiny house outside of Peshawar, capital of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province that borders Afghanistan, and now count themselves among the thousands of civilian refugees fleeing a full-scale military offensive aimed at rooting out terrorist groups from Pakistan’s mountainous regions.

He tells IPS that the situation back in Waziristan, a Taliban stronghold, is “pathetic”, as scores of families abandon their homes and all their possessions to escape the Pakistan army’s airstrikes, which have resulted in food shortages and widespread panic since they began in earnest on Jun. 15.

“We traveled on foot for five hours just to hire a vehicle that would bring us to Peshawar, and from there we traveled even further to reach Bannu [an ancient city in KP],” the distraught man continued.

“Those who have been uprooted by the conflict have no choice but to live in congested conditions." -- Dr. Fayaz Ali, a public health expert in Bannu
“Three of my five sons developed temperatures along the way and we don’t have money to consult doctors or purchase medicines,” Ali said.

It is likely that all the other 100,000 displaced people now living in 65,000 government-sponsored tents in KP are experiencing similar hardships, with several people clamouring to share their own stories of escape.

Some say they left Waziristan on tractor-trolleys with nothing but the clothes on their backs; others loaded small bundles onto donkey-driven carts but left behind all but the most basic items for fear of overburdening the beasts.

Many left in such a hurry they were separated from their family members.

Zainab Khatoon, a horsewoman from Waziristan, arrived in Bannu with two of her children but has no idea of the whereabouts of her husband and elder son.

“As soon as the government-imposed curfew was relaxed, we left for Bannu,” the 42-year-old woman recounted to IPS. “My husband and son stayed behind to collect rations like biscuits, rice, tea and oil from our local shop. Three days have passed and they have still not arrived,” she lamented.

Several others told IPS they too have lost loved ones in the chaos.

“We are extremely concerned about people’s missing relatives,” Jawad Ahmed, a camp official, confided to IPS, adding that many of those who arrive are afraid to register their presence with officials for fear of violating the Taliban’s ban on seeking government assistance.

By Sunday, the total number of displaced persons had reached 394,000, with many refugees thought to have crossed the border into neighbouring Afghanistan due to a lack of “electricity, water, food and medical supplies” in KP, Muhammad Rahim, an official with the National Disaster Management Authority, told IPS.

Besides Bannu, the most popular destinations in KP appear to be Lakki Marwat, Tank, Karak and Hangu.

“KP has so far received over 7,000 families, or close to 100,000 people,” an official named Sajjid Khan told IPS, adding that some families are making their way towards the southern cities of Lahore and Karachi.

In anticipation of an extended military campaign, the government has allocated one billion dollars to relief for the displaced population, which will go towards erecting shelters, toilets and possibly even schools for the youth.

Shoaib Sultan, a political analyst at the University of Peshawar, believes the operation is unlikely to end in the immediate future and people are destined to witness hard times.

“The scorching heat, with a temperature of 45 degrees Celsius, has multiplied the woes of the people, many of whom are simply taking shelter under trees on roadsides,” he told IPS.

Codenamed Zarb-e-Asb (meaning the sword of Prophet Muhammad strikes), the army operation is in part a response to the insurgent attack on Karachi international airport earlier this month, which killed 18 people.

While many welcome the government’s hard-line approach to persistent terrorism, it appears that impoverished residents are bearing the brunt of attacks, as they have for nearly a decade.

Some politicians, like Imran Khan of the Pakistan Tehreek-e Insaf (Pakistan Movement for Justice), have called on the government to suspend the operation until residents can be safely evacuated.

Housing system pushed to its limits

Since 2005, the military has made sporadic efforts to wipe out insurgents from the border regions, where the mountainous terrain provided a convenient base for Taliban members fleeing U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

Caught between the army and the militants, civilians were forced to leave the tribal regions altogether.

A mass exodus that has continued more or less uninterrupted for nearly nine years has already seen 2.1 million people flee their homes in FATA, only to descend on the neighbouring province of KP, where officials have struggled to meet their needs.

Many have lived in wretched conditions for years, with little access to food, water and proper sanitation, in mud huts or camps.

Dr. Fayaz Ali, a public health expert, is worried about what the latest refugee wave means for Pakistan’s ability to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) – a set of poverty reduction targets agreed upon by the United Nations, which includes lessening the number of slum-dwellers by 100 million by 2015.

“Those who have been uprooted by the conflict have no choice but to live in congested conditions,” Ali told IPS.

Prior to the latest influx of refugees, Bannu was playing host to 50,000 displaced families.

Estate dealers here say the demand for houses was already skyrocketing, as people jostled for the few available residential units, while those unable to afford formal housing occupied mud huts.

Officials say there is literally no room to house the incoming refugees, who are for the time being occupying government schools in order to minimise the spread of diseases in overcrowded camps.

“We are treating the displaced people for food- and water-borne ailments,” said Rehmat Shar, a Bannu-based doctor.

“We have seen about 650 patients, which included 200 women and 300 children. Most of the patients required rehydration due to the unrelenting heat,” Shah, who works in the district headquarters hospital, informed IPS.

“The living conditions are miserable,” added Wahidullah Khan, a former resident of the Mir Ali town in North Waziristan who rushed his family of eight to Bannu as soon as the army launched its operation.

“We live in a small house made of mud and stones, which lacks electricity,” Ali said. “And my children have to walk long distances to collect water.”

He and his wife say they left everything behind when they escaped and are now figuring out how to start their lives from scratch.

(END)