Peshawar, January 05: When Samiullah Jan was told to pack his few belongings and get ready to head back home to war-ravaged Afghanistan, he felt being sentenced to death. But after few days, he was granted clemency.
“I am very happy that at least for the next three years I won’t be forced to leave,” the Afghan refugee, who has been taking shelter in the suburbs of Peshawar for the past nine years, told.
Like millions of Afghans, Jan and his family fled their home after the 2001 American invasion and headed to neighboring Pakistan.
Initially, he stayed in the Jalozai refugee camp in the north of Peshawar, the capital of the North Western Frontier Province, which borders Afghanistan.
He later moved to the suburban area of Bara.
Jan was supposed to leave Pakistan on December 31, the expiry date for the permission given to Afghan refugees to stay in Pakistan, according to the Afghan Refugees Commissionaire, which deals with refugees’ affairs in Pakistan.
However, the deadline has been extended for three years at the request of the UN High Commission for Refugees and the Afghan government after talks with Islamabad.
“The new year has brought luck to me,” says a jubilant Jan.
According to the UNHCR, Pakistan is home to some 1.7 million registered Afghans, slightly more than half of them live outside refugee camps, mostly in urban centers.
They are allowed to live, work and attend schools in the country.
Thousands of Afghans, who have managed to set up businesses in different parts of Pakistan, have already got permanent national identification cards, taking advantage of their facial resemblance with local Pushtuns.
Return to What
For Jan, a 100-dollar aid, a tent, and some blankets could not lure him back to his war-stricken homeland.
“Everybody wants to go back to his home, but of course not at the cost of his life,” said Jan, who hails from the northeastern Khost province, one of the hotspots of deadly fighting between the US-led foreign troops and Taliban fighters.
Saadullah Khan, another Afghan refugee, says that dearth of economic opportunities in Afghanistan would make him thinks a thousand times before returning home.
“How long can we survive on the basis of our meager savings,” Khan, who currently owns a carpet shop in Saddar, the main bazaar of Peshawar, told IOL.
“Economic conditions are not that conducive there for us. It will almost impossible for us to start our business there from zero.”
He laments that the US-promised democracy, law and justice have not yet been realized in Afghanistan.
The West-backed Kabul government has earned a bad reputation for widespread corruption, with everything, from jobs to education, having a price.
Transparency International, a German organization that gauges honesty in government, ranked Afghanistan 176 out of 180 countries in 2008.
“No doubt law an order is not good here too, but it’s not a kind of full-fledged war between two armies,” says Khan.
“I will definitely prefer to stay here in any case.”
Unhappy
But while refugees are rejoicing their extended stay, some Pakistanis are not very happy.
“It’s not a good decision as far as security issues are concerned,” Imtiaz Hussain, a resident of Peshawar, told.
According to the Interior Ministry, around one million more Afghans are staying illegally in different parts of Pakistan, mainly in southern port city of Karachi, and the northeastern cities of Lahore and Rawalpindi.
Many of them are allegedly involved in different kind of crimes.
Intelligence agencies last year sent a report to the federal government indicating that the refugee camps have turned into recruitment centers for Taliban militants.
“These refugee camps are also used as safe havens for terrorists. They must be dismantled,” charges Imtiaz.
Many Peshawaris think that the presence of Afghan refugees has lessened economic opportunities for them.
“We are already reeling under unemployment and poor economic conditions. We cannot bear their burden any more,” says Imtiaz.
“Enough is enough. It’s time to send them back to their country.”
-Agencies