UN Committed to Working With Pakistan for Voluntary Returns of Afghan Refugees
- More than 2.68 million Afghans returned to Afghanistan between September 2023 and August 2024 as Pakistan enforced the first phase of its Illegal Foreigners Repatriation Plan.
- United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres stated on Tuesday that the international body remains committed to working with Pakistan to uphold migrant protection principles.
- Despite these diplomatic engagements, Pakistan has maintained the forcible deportation of undocumented immigrants and refugees under its Interior Ministry framework initiated in 2023.
More than 2.68 million Afghans returned to Afghanistan between September 2023 and August 2024 as Pakistan enforced the first phase of its Illegal Foreigners Repatriation Plan. The mass deportations contrast sharply with United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres’s insistence during a visit to Islamabad that all returns must proceed in a voluntary, safe, and dignified manner.
UN Demands Protection Principles While Pakistan Continues Deportations
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres stated on Tuesday that the international body remains committed to working with Pakistan to uphold migrant protection principles. Speaking alongside Pakistani Foreign Minister Mohammad Ishaq Dar in Islamabad, Guterres acknowledged Pakistan’s decades-long history of hosting millions of Afghan refugees fleeing past conflicts and instability, according to sources.
Despite these diplomatic engagements, Pakistan has maintained the forcible deportation of undocumented immigrants and refugees under its Interior Ministry framework initiated in 2023. Data from the United Nations Organization for International Migration indicates that approximately 776,000 Afghans returned to Afghanistan in 2026 alone, a figure that includes individuals forcibly expelled across the border.
Many Afghan returnees continue to face significant human rights violations and protection risks inside Afghanistan.
United Nations
Displaced Families Face Crisis Conditions Inside Afghanistan
Thirty-year-old Asadullah Safi, who was born in Pakistan and spent more than 40 years living in a refugee camp near Peshawar City, now faces permanent displacement to a country where he has never lived. Safi told that Pakistani security forces destroyed his family home and forced them to abandon the camp, leaving them to live in hiding within makeshift shelters.
Returnees encounter severe economic and humanitarian barriers upon arrival. Abdul Hamid Jalili, former Afghan attaché for refugees in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, warned that the mass deportations threaten to trigger a wider humanitarian crisis because returnees require immediate employment, housing, and public services that Afghanistan’s current administration cannot provide.
reported that the repatriation crisis unfolds amid persistent security tensions between Islamabad and the Taliban administration, driven by cross-border clashes and Pakistan’s security demands regarding militant groups operating from Afghan territory. Meanwhile, noted that regional deportations extend beyond Pakistan, with Iranian authorities concurrently arresting and expelling undocumented Afghans as millions remain dependent on dwindling international humanitarian assistance.
Diplomatic Agenda Ignores Funding Gaps for Afghan Refugees
While Guterres received the Nishan-e-Imtiaz civilian honor from Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari at the presidential palace in Islamabad, the diplomatic agenda left critical questions unanswered regarding the fate of the remaining 1.6 million Afghans still residing in Pakistan, including roughly 160,000 undocumented refugees. International bodies have not clarified how future returns will be monitored to guarantee voluntary compliance, nor has the international community bridged the severe funding gap required to sustain millions of vulnerable returnees inside Afghanistan.