By NNN-Bernama
Islamabad : Pakistan will send back all Afghan refugees, particularly those settled in Balochistan and the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), to their homeland by 2009, Pakistan's Minister for States and Frontier Region Sardar Yar Mohammed Rind has said.
"Four Afghan refugee camps in Balochistan and the NWFP will be definitely closed and all the refugees would be sent back to their country by Dec 30, 2009," PTI quoted the Dawn report on Monday.
According to government estimates, at present there are over two million Afghan refugees in Pakistan and a majority of them are settled in the NWFP.
Stating that the government has been holding talks with local leaders in both the areas to work out ways for the peaceful closure of the camps, Rind said, "We don't want to send them (refugees) back by force because they have been our guests for 25 years. We want their honourable repatriation."
He also expressed hope that both the governments of Balochistan and the NWPF would extend their cooperation in closing the camps.
The government had already asked the 'unregistered' refugees, declared as 'illegal immigrants', to return to their country under the UNHCR's voluntary repatriation programme, the Minister said, adding US$15 million has so far been spent in this regard.
"The property and documents of all illegal Afghan immigrants would soon be confiscated as being foreigners they have no right to buy land in Pakistan," he said.
Claiming that there're three lakh Afghan refugees without 'proof of registration' in the Islamic nation, Rind said that over two lakh 'illegal immigrants' had already been repatriated since the formal completion of the registration process.