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Al Arabiya
12 hours ago
- Al Arabiya
Pakistan extends Afghan refugee deportation deadline to Sept. 1
Pakistan extended the deadline for the deportation of millions of Afghan refugees to Sept. 1, officials said Wednesday as the United Nations welcomed the decision while expressing concern over coerced returns. Afghans have fled to Pakistan over the past four decades to escape war, political instability and economic hardship in their homeland. An estimated 1.4 million are now registered with the UN refugee agency and have Proof of Residence cards, or PoR, issued by Pakistani authorities, which have refused to reissue them after June 30, the original deadline for voluntary repatriation, drawing criticism from rights groups. The refugees will be allowed a 'grace period' of 25 days, from August 4 to August 31, to voluntarily return to their home country, said Lateef-ur-Rehman, a spokesman for the Home and Tribal Affairs Department. He added that Islamabad approved the new deadline this week, after which those remaining could face arrest and forced expulsion. Islamabad is also targeting an additional 800,000 with Afghan Citizen Cards, who it says reside in the country illegally. While the UN refugee agency welcomed the extension decision, it warned that forced deportation could violate the international principle of non-refoulement, which prohibits the return of individuals to a country where they face serious threats to their life or freedom. Qaiser Khan Afridi, UNHCR's spokesperson in Pakistan, said the agency continued to seek an 'extension of the validity of PoR cards.' At least 1.2 million Afghans have been forced to return to Afghanistan from Iran and Pakistan so far this year, according to a June report by UNHCR. Though hundreds of thousands of Afghans live in refugee camps, many others have fully integrated into the community, with families and businesses of their own, and remain in hiding to avoid arrest. Rights groups have voiced concern that their arrest and deportation would wreak havoc on their lives. Rehman, the ministry spokesperson, said local authorities have been instructed to engage with Afghan community leaders to encourage voluntary repatriation and that there are plans to close down refugee camps, but no dates have been decided on.
Arab News
a day ago
- Arab News
Amid crackdown, Pakistan's largest real estate company on brink of complete shutdown — owner
KARACHI: Pakistani real estate magnate Malik Riaz Hussain said on Tuesday his property empire was on the verge of total shutdown, blaming a widening state crackdown over what is widely believed to be his links with jailed former prime minister Imran Khan. Hussain — one of Pakistan's wealthiest and most influential businessmen, best known as the chairman of Bahria Town Limited — has spoken publicly for months about being pressured due to 'political motives' and facing financial losses as the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) opens cases against his property development projects across Pakistan. While he has not explicitly named who was pressuring him or why, media and analysts widely speculate the crackdown relates to the Al-Qadir Trust case, which involves accusations Khan and his wife, during his premiership from 2018-2022, were given land by Hussain as a bribe in exchange for illegal favors. In January, a court sentenced Khan to 14 years imprisonment in the Al-Qadir Trust case. In January, NAB said it had kickstarted the process of seeking the extradition from the UAE of Hussain in connection with the land bribe case. Hussain has been widely known for decades for his links with political parties, the media and the civil and military establishment, and has been considered 'untouchable' in the past. In a post on social media platform X on Tuesday, the property tycoon said authorities had frozen Bahria Town's bank accounts, seized vehicles and arrested dozens of employees, which had 'paralyzed' the company's operations and brought development work to a halt. 'The situation has reached a point where we are being forced to completely shut down all Bahria Town activities across Pakistan,' Hussain said. 'We apologize to the residents and stakeholders of Bahria Town.' In January, Defense Minister Khawaja Asif said the government would pursue Hussain's return from the United Arab Emirates. The same month, NAB had put out a public notice cautioning people against investing in Hussain's new real estate venture to build luxury apartments in Dubai: 'If the general public at large invests in the stated project, their actions would be tantamount to money laundering, for which they may face criminal and legal proceedings.' Responding to NAB on X at the time, Hussain had said 'fake cases, blackmailing and greed of officers' had forced him to relocate from the country because he was not willing to be a 'political pawn.' More recently, local media has reported that Hussain may have left the UAE for an unknown location to avoid extradition proceedings. In his X post on Tuesday, Hussain appealed to state institutions to adopt a more conciliatory approach: 'I make a final appeal from the bottom of my heart for a chance to return to serious dialogue and a dignified resolution. For this purpose, we assure you of our full participation in any arbitration process and our commitment to implementing its decision 100 percent. I also assure you that if the arbitration decision requires payment of money from our side, we will ensure its payment.' Bahria Town, founded in the late 1990s, is one of Pakistan's largest private employers and a major developer of luxury housing schemes across the country. Over the years, the company has been the subject of multiple investigations over illegal land acquisitions and unauthorized development but has continued to operate. AL-QADIR TRUST CASE In 2019, Britain's National Crime Agency (NCA) said Hussain had agreed to hand over 190 million pounds held in Britain to settle a UK investigation into whether the money was from the proceeds of crime. The NCA said it had agreed to a settlement in which Hussain would hand over a property, 1 Hyde Park Place, valued at 50 million pounds, and cash frozen in British bank accounts. The NCA had previously secured nine freezing orders covering 140 million pounds in the accounts on the grounds that the money may have been acquired illegally. The agency said the assets would be passed to the government of Pakistan and the settlement with Hussain was 'a civil matter, and does not represent a finding of guilt.' The case made against Hussain and ex-PM Khan was that instead of putting the tycoon's settlement money in Pakistan's treasury, Khan's government used the money to pay fines levied by a court against Hussain for illegal acquisition of government lands at below-market value for development in Karachi. Hussain, who hasn't appeared before an anti-graft agency to submit his reply to summons issued to him, has denied any wrongdoing. Khan and his wife have also pleaded innocence.
Arab News
a day ago
- Arab News
Pakistan to start deporting Afghan Proof of Registration card holders from Sept. 1
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan will start deporting around 1.4 million Afghan Proof of Registration (PoR) card holders from September 1, the Pakistani interior ministry said on Monday, as Islamabad gave a fresh call for Afghan nationals to leave the country. Millions of Afghans have poured into Pakistan over the past several decades, fleeing successive wars, as well as hundreds of thousands who arrived after the return of the Taliban government in 2021. A deportation drive first launched in 2023 was renewed in April when Pakistan's government rescinded hundreds of thousands of residence permits for Afghans, threatening to arrest anyone who did not leave. Islamabad this year said it wanted 3 million Afghans to leave the country, including 1.4 million people with PoR cards and some 800,000 with Afghan Citizen Cards (ACC). 'Afghan nationals holding Proof of Registration (PoR) cards shall be repatriated to Afghanistan as part of the ongoing implementation of the Illegal Foreigners Repatriation Plan (IFRP),' the interior ministry said in a notification issued on Monday. 'It has been decided that the voluntary return of PoR card holders shall commence forthwith, while the formal repatriation and deportation process will take effect from 1st September 2025.' More than a million Afghans have left Pakistan since the expulsion drive first began in 2023, according to data from the UN refugee agency (UNHCR). Pakistan previously said those with PoR cards could stay until June 30, while the government has deported thousands of ACC holders. 'The repatriation of illegal foreign nationals, including Afghan Citizen Card (ACC) holders, will continue as per the earlier decision under the IFRP,' the interior ministry added. In 2023, Islamabad said many of these Afghan refugees were found involved in militancy and crimes. Analysts say the expulsions are designed to pressure neighboring Afghanistan's Taliban authorities to control militancy in the border regions. Pakistan's security forces are under enormous pressure along the border with Afghanistan, battling a growing insurgency by ethnic nationalists in Balochistan in the southwest and the Pakistani Taliban and its affiliates in the northwest. Last year, Pakistan recorded the highest number of deaths from attacks in a decade and the government frequently accused Afghan nationals of taking part in assaults. Qaiser Khan Afridi, a spokesperson for the UN refugee agency, this week urged Islamabad to adopt a 'humane approach to ensure voluntary, gradual, and dignified return of Afghans' and praised Pakistan for hosting millions of Afghan refugees for more than 40 years, the AP news agency reported. 'We call on the government to halt the forcible return and ensure a gradual, voluntary and dignified repatriation process,' Afridi said. 'Such massive and hasty return could jeopardize the lives and freedom of Afghan refugees, while also risking instability not only in Afghanistan but across the region.'
