The Afghans being evicted by Pakistan will make the contentious Durand
Line more porous and vulnerable to cross-border movement of Islamist
militants and further radicalise the Af-Pak region, Pakistani analysts have
said.
In a mix of late realisation and admission, Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry, a former
Pakistan Foreign Secretary, dwelling on Kabul sheltering the Tehreek-e-
Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a sore point with Islamabad, has stated: “The TTP
wants to do what the Afghan Taliban would welcome: establish an Islamic
emirate in the tribal belt straddling the Af-Pak border.”
At the geopolitical level, Pakistani analysts have accused successive
Pakistan governments of seeking “strategic depth” vis a vis India and Iran by
promoting the Afghan Taliban and failing in the face of their long-time ‘guests’
and beneficiaries turning hostile now that they are in power – with
Islamabad’s active support. For decades Pakistan remained the Taliban’s
chief champion and loudspeaker to the world. Failure of Pakistan’s strategic
depth doctrine is why Afghan refugees are being victimised.
The Afghan Taliban have termed the TTP issue Pakistan’s “internal problem”
and have stopped cooperating after some attempts at persuading the TTP to
return or accept being relocated away from the Pak-Af border. “It is clear that
the Afghan Taliban are unlikely to take any kinetic action against the TTP on
their soil. It is worth recalling how their first government defended the Al
Qaeda leader’s right to stay in Afghanistan despite intense US pressure.”
Other Pakistani analysts like Pervez Hoodbhoy, have pointed to “Pashtun
wali”, the tradition of hospitality that prevails and have pointed out that the
Afghan Taliban and the TTP are “two sides of the same coin.” They have
blamed both the political class and the strategy planners for falsely nursing
the hope that sheltered for two decades, the Afghan Taliban would return the
favour. In the process, they have compounded the problem of radical outfits
gaining strength in the tribal belt of Swat and Waziristan.
On the day United Nations human rights chief Volker Turk expressed alarm
over reports of “abuse, including ill-treatment, arbitrary arrests and detention,
destruction of property and personal belongings and extortion” of 1.7 million
unregistered Afghan nationals not enjoying refugee status under international
norms, there is speculation over even the registered ones being forced out.
Turk said the UNHRC had received “first-hand accounts from Afghans
crossing the border who allege they were subjected to arbitrary treatment or
abuse by Pakistan authorities, according to the statement.” The Pakistani
media reports speak of extortion of the departing Afghans and ‘enjoying’ the
belongings, including cattle that the latter are leaving behind or not allowed to
carry.
The forced migration has been termed “another Partition”. Over 200,000,
including those born in Pakistan, have already returned to a land that they do
not know or fear persecution from the Taliban regime that they fled earlier.
There are prospects of women not being allowed to work and move freely
and girls being denied school and higher education. “…. many of those returning now might come back to Pakistan in the near future because there is no real economic pull for them to settle in
Afghanistan, Chaudhry wrote in Dawn newspaper (November 19, 2023).
“Once these unfortunates cross the Torkham border, hell awaits them. Large
numbers have never visited, much less known, the famine-stricken land to
which they allegedly belong. Hundreds of thousands were born on Pakistani
soil but could never acquire documents.” Hoodbhoy complained.
Pakistani analysts have also been critical of the insinuation that the Afghan
refugees were behind the spurt of suicide bombings and terror attacks in
several parts of the country. This is seen as a ruse to justify the abrupt action
of evicting them.
Those born in Pakistan should have the right to be termed “economic
migrants” and even citizenship is another argument to support a halt to the
eviction.
There is, however, no reference to the proverbial elephant in the room – the
all-powerful army. It is driving the policies and actions of a caretaker
government, while the political class is busy with elections due next February.
Analysts say the army is using the absence of the political class that is
swayed by popular considerations that dilute the priorities of the security
establishment to evict as many Afghans as it can from the Pakistani soil.