Afghan refugees in KP....PTI's Scapegoats

The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government has expressed its dismay over the presence of such a large number of Afghan refugees in Pakistan, especially in KP. The massive inflow of Afghan refugees began after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. After 9/11, a new exodus began. Pakistan’s failure to restrict these Afghans to refugee camps resulted in the dispersion of many into the cities. This relocation was an attempt by the refugees to rebuild their lives, considering their conflict-riddled country was inhospitable. Though many repatriated voluntarily when conditions back home allowed, a large number, consisting both of registered and unregistered refugees, chose to stay on. Presently there are some three million registered and unregistered Afghan refugees in Pakistan. According to the new agreement reached between the Afghan and Pakistani governments through UNHCR, the Afghan government is liable to start taking back these refugees latest by December 2015. Pakistan is not a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention or its 1967 Protocol and had accommodated the Afghan refugees out of solidarity with its neighbour. The international response to this giant step that stretched Pakistan financially has been increasingly lukewarm over the years. The Afghans influenced Pakistani society variously, but the effects of the Kalashnikov and drug culture have been most conspicuous to date. However, the fault of letting the refugees leave the refugee camps can only be placed at Pakistan’s door. A refugee would always seek a better life and if given the chance, would certainly avail the opportunity. Lack of monitoring on our side provided them this opportunity. The clock cannot be turned back, but we can certainly relocate the Afghans into the camps once again, taking all precautions that they are not hurt or their honour violated.

It is not justified, as the KP government has attempted to do, to link the handlers of the Peshawar massacre operating from Afghan soil with the Afghan refugees. The Peshawar debacle was the doing of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a Pakistani Taliban group. If their handlers from the TTP are in Afghanistan, that requires a different approach to the issue than putting the blame on the refugees. The lesson missed by the KP government is that it had better concentrate on governing its province. It is another matter whether the PTI-led government could have stopped the Peshawar happening had it not been absorbed by the protests and sit-ins, especially when a large military and intelligence presence in KP could not prevent it. What is required is good governance from the PTI, rather than finding scapegoats to cover up its own inadequacies and failings.