Refugees Paying Heavy Toll For Afghan Taliban, Pakistan Tensions

Salman is deeply disturbed as he awaits his fate inside a detention center in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore.

The 22-year-old is being forced to return to Afghanistan, the country of his parents.

But he has never seen the mountainous South Asian nation, which is now emerging from more than four decades of war. He was born and raised in Pakistan, but authorities in the country are now forcing him to return to a country he has never seen.

"I have lived in Pakistan all this time, but it's given me nothing," he told RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal.

Earlier this month, police in Lahore arrested him during a random search and locked him up.

"I was not provided food during those two nights," he said of the conditions during his police detention, where he was kept in a dark room.

He was then moved to a squalid detention center from where he will be forced into Afghanistan, some 600 kilometers away.

Pakistan Rounds Up Afghans As Tensions Soar With Taliban

Salman is among the tens of thousands of Afghans involuntarily returned to their country every week as Pakistan goes ahead with plans to repatriate all Afghan refugees and migrants back into Afghanistan.

Senior Pakistani officials have blamed Afghans for participating in attacks on Pakistani security forces.

Islamabad has repeatedly demanded that the Taliban government in Afghanistan cease support for the Tehrik‑e Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a rebel group fighting in northwestern Pakistan along the border with Afghanistan.

A cease-fire between the two is now under tremendous strain.

Afghan Mourners Bury Dead After Pakistan Strikes

On November 25, the Taliban government blamed Pakistan for air strikes that killed at least 10 people in eastern Afghanistan.

The Taliban and Pakistan's powerful military, which were erstwhile allies, almost went to war last month. As Pakistan launched air strikes against the Afghan capital and the southern city of Kandahar, tensions along their 2,500-kilometer border turned into clashes.

"The brave people of Pakistan, who have lost loved ones in the war against terrorism, now ask: How long will the government continue to bear the burden of Afghan refugees?" Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said last month.

But for many ordinary Afghan refugees and migrants living in Pakistan such as Salman, the forced return is a calamity.

SEE ALSO: Afghan Children In Pakistan Fear Taliban Schools If Forced Home

Pakistan is the only country they have known. Some have established successful businesses while others eke out a living by doing manual labor jobs locals don't want.

Most returning Afghans complain of harassment by the Pakistani authorities. They particularly accuse the police of high-handedness, bribes, and stealing their belongings.

"Nobody is speaking up against this country's cruel policies and abuse by its police," said Jaffar Shah, who is also detained in Lahore.

Shah says the police seek out vulnerable Afghans, mostly laborers or street vendors, in major Pakistani cities. They harass them, rob them of their money and belongings during detention, and then force them back to their country.

A Humanitarian Crisis

Millions of Afghans around the world are being either directly forced to return by states where they have been residing, or have felt compelled to do so because of threats, harassment, and intimidation.

SEE ALSO: As US Ends Protected Status For Afghans, Thousands Face Deportation And Persecution

The situation has sparked a humanitarian crisis in some parts of impoverished Afghanistan where returning refugees have overwhelmed local infrastructure.

In July, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk called for an immediate halt to the forcible return of all Afghan refugees and asylum-seekers, particularly those at risk of persecution, arbitrary detention, or torture upon their return.

Pakistan has hosted one of the largest refugee populations in modern history by welcoming millions of Afghans after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979.

Some returned to their country in the 1990s, and after the collapse of the first Taliban government in late 2001.

Yet before a new drive to expel undocumented Afghans in late 2023, UNHCR, the UN refugee agency, estimated 1.4 million documented and as many undocumented Afghans lived in Pakistan.

The UNHCR estimates that out of these, more than 1.7 million had returned to Afghanistan by the beginning of this month.

As cold weather gripped Afghanistan, the returns and deportations have dramatically increased, even among the estimated 600,000 who fled the Taliban's return to power in 2021.

Denying Afghans' Rights

Islamabad has not signed the 1951 UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees or the 1967 Protocol on the Status of Refugees.

This has enabled subsequent Pakistani governments to deny Afghans rights or a pathway to naturalization.

"We were beaten and forced into trucks, which brought us here," Maryam, a young Afghan mother, told RFE/RL's Radio Azadi from a detention center in the capital, Islamabad, on November 25.

"There are pregnant women and newborns among those detained here," she added.

SEE ALSO: Afghanistan Pivots To Central Asia As It Seeks To End Economic Dependence On Pakistan

This week, Pakistani authorities rounded up Maryam and some 300 Afghan families who have been protesting in a park in Islamabad for months against their possible forced repatriation to Afghanistan.

"Lately Pakistan has been arresting, humiliating. and treating Afghans inhumanely, which is not acceptable under international norms and laws," Fahim Farwak, an Afghan rights activist, told Radio Azadi.

Relentless harassment prompts Afghans to leave the country for good.

"My advice to all Afghans will be to never go to Pakistan because they will get nothing here," Salman said in the detention center in Lahore.

Written by Abubakar Siddique based on reporting by RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal and RFE/RL's Radio Azadi