Azadeh Moshiri and Usman Zahid
BBC News, Islamabad
Bbc
The father of “Nabila” served in the Afghan army and his family feared being deported to Afghanistan
“I’m afraid,” sobbed Nabila.
The 10 -year life is limited to his house in a room in Islamabad and the dirt road outside. Since December, she has not gone to her local school, when she decided that she would no longer accept Afghans without a valid Pakistani birth certificate. But even if she could go to class, Nabila says she wouldn’t.
“I was sick one day and I heard that the police came in search of Afghan children,” she cries, while she tells us that her friend’s family was sent back to Afghanistan.
Nabila is not her real name – all the names of the Afghans mentioned in this article have been modified for their safety.
The capital of Pakistan and the neighboring city of Rawalpindi attend an increase in deportations, arrests and detention of the Afghans, says the UN. He estimates that more than half of the three million Afghans in the country are undocumented.
The Afghans describe a life of constant fear and daily police raids on their homes.
Some told the BBC that they feared to be killed if they returned to Afghanistan. These include families of an American resettlement program, which was suspended by the Trump administration.
Pakistan is frustrated by the duration of resettlement programs, explains Philippa Candler, the representative of the United Nations agency in Islamabad. The International Organization for United Nations Migration (OIM) claims that 930 people were sent back to Afghanistan in the first half, double the figure two weeks earlier. At least 20% of people expelled from Islamabad and Rawalpindi had documentation from the United Nations Refugees Agency, which means that they were recognized as people with international protection.
Hamed claims that calls to the United Nations refugee agency have responded.
But Pakistan has not gone to the Convention of Refugees and previously declared that it did not recognize the Afghans living in the country as refugees. The government said its policies aimed at all illegal foreign nationals and that the deadline of departure is imminent. This date has fluctuated but is now set for March 31 for those who have no valid visas, and June 30 for those who have reinstallation letters.
Many Afghans are terrified in the middle of the confusion. They also say that the visa process can be difficult to navigate. Nabila’s family thinks they only have one option: hide. His father Hamid served in the Afghan army, before the Taliban takeover in 2021. He melted in tears describing his white nights.
“I served my country and now I am useless. This work condemned me,” he said.
His family is without visas and does not appear on a resettlement list. They tell us that their telephone calls to the UN refugee agency remain unanswered.
The BBC contacted the agency to comment.
The Taliban government has already told the BBC that all Afghans should come back because they could “live in the country without fear”. He claims that these refugees are “economic migrants”.
But a UN report in 2023 questioned the insurance of the Taliban government. He found that hundreds of former government representatives and members of the armed forces were killed despite general amnesty.
The guarantees of the Taliban government are not very reassured to the Nabila family, they therefore choose to run when the authorities are nearby. The neighbors offer themselves a shelter because they all try to avoid returning to Afghanistan.
The UN counted 1,245 Afghans arrested or detained in January through Pakistan, more than double the same period last year.
Nabila says the Afghans should not be forced to go out. “Do not give the Afghans out of their house – we are not here by choice, we are forced to be here.”
There is a feeling of sadness and loneliness in their house. “I had a friend who was here and who was then expelled in Afghanistan,” said Nabila’s mother Maryam.
“She was like a sister, a mother. The day we were separated was a difficult day.”
I ask Nabila what she wants to do when she is older. “Modeling,” she said, giving me a serious look. Everyone in the room smiles. The deget tension.
Her mother whispers, there are many other things she could be, an engineer or a lawyer. Nabila’s modeling dream is the one she could never continue under the Taliban government. With their restrictions on the education of girls, his mother’s suggestions would also be impossible.
A new phase
Pakistan has a long record of Afghan refugees. But cross -border attacks increased and fueled the tension between the two neighbors. Pakistan blame them on activists based in Afghanistan, which the Taliban government denies. Since September 2023, the year of Pakistan has launched its “repatriation plan for illegal foreigners”, 836,238 individuals have now been sent back to Afghanistan.
In the middle of this current phase of deportations, some Afghans take place in the Haji camp in Islamabad. Ahmad was in the final phase of the United States resettlement program. He tells us when President Donald Trump suspended him for examination, he turned off Ahmad’s “last hope”. The BBC has seen what seems to be its letter of employment by a Christian non -profit Western group in Afghanistan.
The Afghans protested the suspension of the American resettlement program
A few weeks ago, when he was shopping, he received a call. His three-year-old daughter was at stake. “My baby called, the Baba police are there, the police come to our door,” he said. The extension of his wife’s visa was still pending and she was busy pleading with the police.
Ahmad ran at home. “I couldn’t leave them behind.” He said he sat in a van and waited for hours when the police continued his raids. The wives and children of his neighbors continued to flow into the vehicle. Ahmad began to receive calls from their husbands, the begging to take care of them. They had already escaped in the woods.
His family was detained for three days in “unimaginable conditions”, explains Ahmad, who claims that he only received one family coverage, and a piece of bread per day, and that their phones were confiscated. The Pakistani government says it guarantees that “no one is mistreated or harassed during the repatriation process”.
We try to visit inside the Haji camp to check the Ahmad account, but we are refused by the authorities. The BBC approached the Pakistani government and the police for an interview or a declaration, but no one has been made available.
This woman claims that her sister was detained in the Haji camp in Islamabad
Fear of being detained or expelled, some families have chosen to leave Islamabad and Rawalpindi. Others tell us that they just can’t afford it.
A woman claims that she was in the last stages of the American resettlement program and decided to move with her two daughters in Attock, 80 km (50 miles) west of Islamabad. “I can barely allow myself bread,” she said.
The BBC saw a document confirming that it had an interview with the IOM in early January. She claims that her family is still assisted by almost daily raids in her neighborhood.
A spokesperson for the United States Embassy in Islamabad said that he was in “close communication” with the government of Pakistan “on the status of Afghan nationals in the American resettlement pathways”.
Outside the doors of Haji Camp, a woman is waiting. She tells us that she has a valid visa but that of her sister expired. His sister is now held inside the camp, as well as her children. The police would not allow her to visit her family and she is terrified, they will be expelled. She is starting to cry: “If my country was safe, why was I coming here in Pakistan? And even here, we cannot live peacefully.”
She points to her own daughter who is sitting in their car. She was a singer in Afghanistan, where a law declares that women cannot be heard about their home outside, not to mention singing. I turn to her daughter and ask myself if she still sings. She looks. “No.”
