Earlier this week Nasim was leaving the only home he\u2019s ever known, trudging toward Pakistan\u2019s border alongside tens of thousands of fellow Afghan refugees who like him have been given a deadline to depart the country. <\/p>\n
\u201cI was born in Pakistan, I\u2019ve lived here for 42 years, I went to school in Pakistan,\u201d said Nasim, who had traveled to the Torkham border crossing from the northern city Peshawar. \u201cI\u2019ve never been to Afghanistan.\u201d <\/p>\n
In a move that has upturned countless lives, Pakistan ordered all Afghan refugees and migrants without official identity documents to leave the country by November 1 \u2013 and vowed to deport any who remain after that date. <\/p>\n
That has left Nasim, who only uses one name, and many others like him facing the grim prospect of a new life under the repressive rule of the Taliban. <\/p>\n
Since seizing control of Afghanistan in August 2021, the radical Islamist group has cracked down on women\u2019s rights,\u00a0closed\u00a0secondary schools for girls,\u00a0banned women from\u00a0attending university\u00a0or entering many public spaces, and prohibited them from working in most sectors. Under its watch the country has also been grappling with widespread hunger, disease and lack of clean water. <\/p>\n
But Nasim and other migrants have little choice but to head back. On Thursday, Pakistani authorities began rounding up those who remained, with more than 100 arrested in the city of Quetta and taken to holding centers. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe didn\u2019t have money, we left our business, our homes, it was difficult for us to get here. There is no water here,\u201d said Nasim. <\/p>\n
\u201cMy children have been pulled out of school \u2013 the day my children didn\u2019t go to school was like a day of dying for me,\u201d Nasim added. \u201cIn Afghanistan there is no school for girls.\u201d <\/p>\n
Located at the western edge of the famed Khyber Pass, Torkham has seen generations of Afghans flee and return during the tumultuous four decades of war that have blighted the nation. <\/p>\n
Many fled the Soviet invasion in the 1980s and the mujahideen\u2019s long, eventually successful fight back. Others took flight during the civil war that erupted following the Soviet retreat that led to the Taliban\u2019s initial rise. <\/p>\n
A new generation went to Pakistan in the aftermath of September 11 attacks, ebbing and flowing during the near two decades of conflict that followed. The Taliban\u2019s return to power in 2021 following the United States\u2019 chaotic withdrawal sparked another wave of some 600,000 refugees. <\/p>\n
Now Afghans from all those different generations are being told to go back. <\/p>\n
Pakistan\u2019s caretaker\u00a0Interior Minister Sarfraz Bugti has previously said security concerns were behind the deportation order, claiming that Afghan nationals had carried out 14 of the 24 major terrorist attacks that have taken place in Pakistan this year. <\/p>\n
But the order has been criticized by international rights groups both for its massive scope and for the way it is being carried out, with many Afghans alleging mistreatment by Pakistani authorities. <\/p>\n
Pakistan is home to more than two million undocumented Afghans. Their presence has long been controversial, and this is not the first time they have faced\u00a0police crackdowns and threats of deportation.\u00a0Authorities announced the latest mass deportation movement on October 3, giving migrants less than a month to pack up their lives and leave. <\/p>\n
International bodies and human rights groups have warned of a looming humanitarian disaster as they return. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe urge the Pakistan authorities to suspend forcible returns of Afghan nationals before it is too late to avoid a human rights catastrophe,\u201d said\u00a0Ravina Shamdasani, spokesperson for the\u00a0Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), in a statement ahead of the deadline. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe believe many of those facing deportation will be at grave risk of human rights violations if returned to Afghanistan, including arbitrary arrest and detention, torture, cruel and other inhuman treatment,\u201d she added. <\/p>\n
They have also criticized Pakistan for its methods of enforcing the order. <\/p>\n
Human Rights Watch claimed on Tuesday the Pakistani government was using \u201cthreats, abuse, and detention to coerce Afghan asylum seekers without legal status to return to Afghanistan or face deportation.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cPolice would catch us and ask us for money, we didn\u2019t have money to pay them,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve lived here for over 40 years \u2026 I\u2019ve grown old in Pakistan, but we\u2019ve been told to go so we\u2019re going.\u201d <\/p>\n
Nearly 60,000 Afghans left Pakistan within the first half of October, with the majority citing fear of arrest,\u00a0according to\u00a0the UN refugee agency and the\u00a0International Organization for Migration. <\/p>\n
A little over 129,000 have fled from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as of Thursday, according to the provincial home department. Some 38,000 have crossed through the Chaman border crossing further west in Balochistan. <\/p>\n
Raza Muhammad, a father of 10, was one of those preparing to leave through Chaman this week. <\/p>\n
Muhammad said he had toiled for years as a domestic worker and said harassment from local police was routine. He hoped the Taliban would greet those forced out of Pakistan and help them find new jobs. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no other choice for me, we are at the mercy of new people,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
Akhtar Muhammad, 22, said he was born and had lived his whole live in Quetta, Balochistan\u2019s largest city. <\/p>\n
\u201cMy father has lived here for 40 years, we don\u2019t know how to speak Pashto properly,\u201d he said, referring to the language spoken by the Pashtun tribes that live along the Afghan-Pakistan border. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t know what kind of environment there will be there (in Afghanistan),\u201d he added. <\/p>\n
In a statement on Monday, a spokesperson from Pakistan\u2019s Ministry of Foreign Affairs responded to the OHCHR saying the country \u201ctakes its commitments towards protection and safety needs of those in vulnerable situations with utmost seriousness. Our record of the last 40 years in hosting millions of our Afghan brothers and sisters speaks for itself.\u201d <\/p>\n
Even the Taliban has been critical, urging Pakistan to \u201cstop the process of one-time deportation of Afghan immigrants,\u201d saying it was \u201cagainst neighborliness customs and Islamic and humanitarian standards.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cAfghans have not created problems for the security of the countries in which they live, nor are they involved in instability,\u201d the Taliban said in a statement. <\/p>\n
The group said some of its officials had visited the Torkham crossing on Tuesday to oversee the return of migrants from Pakistan and ordered temporary camps to be set up in the area. <\/p>\n
Many Afghan migrants in Pakistan had been awaiting resettlement to other countries like the United States, United Kingdom and Canada, but those hopes are now in limbo as they return instead to the conflict-wracked nation they once fled. <\/p>\n
For some, it\u2019s a matter of life and death. <\/p>\n
Afghan journalist Zahid Bahand gave up everything to flee with his family after the Taliban took power \u2013 selling his car, his home and other possessions to make the escape. Surviving in Pakistan was another challenge as the Pakistani government did not grant their applications for official documents, without which his children can\u2019t go to school, he said. <\/p>\n
The harassment by police got so intense he was afraid to leave his residential area. But, he said, returning to Afghanistan would be far worse. <\/p>\n
\u201cIf I\u2019m deported, there will be lots of problems, the Taliban will kill me,\u201d he said. \u201cI have left everything. I have no home. I was in jail in Afghanistan under the Talibs for three months, there is no place for me there.\u201d <\/p>\n
In the first weeks after the 2021 takeover, harrowing accounts emerged of the Taliban detaining and brutally assaulting reporters covering a protest in Kabul \u2013 heightening anxiety in a country already dangerous for journalists. <\/p>\n
The steady deterioration of human rights under the Taliban since its return to power have only confirmed the worst fears of many Afghans. <\/p>\n
The Islamist group has since ordered\u00a0judges to\u00a0impose a strict interpretation of Sharia law\u00a0that includes public executions, amputations and flogging. <\/p>\n
The prospect of returning to Afghanistan, and the pressures of providing for his children in Pakistan as the walls close in, have left Bahand too afraid to sleep. <\/p>\n
\u201cI am ashamed, what kind of man am I that I can\u2019t help my family?\u201d he said, visibly emotional. \u201cI die every minute \u2026 My fault is that I\u2019m a human? That I\u2019m an Afghan, that I\u2019m a journalist?\u201d <\/p>\n\n
Earlier this week Nasim was leaving the only home he\u2019s ever known, trudging toward Pakistan\u2019s border alongside tens of thousands of fellow Afghan refugees who like him have been given a deadline to depart the country. \u201cI was born in Pakistan, I\u2019ve lived here for 42 years, I went to school in Pakistan,\u201d said Nasim, <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":11124,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-11123","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11123"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11123\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}