Punjab Information Minister Azma Bukhari has announced cash rewards for citizens who report illegally residing Afghan and foreign nationals in the province.
In an official statement, Bukhari said that operations against illegally residing Afghans and other foreigners are ongoing, and those providing information will be financially rewarded. She added that in the past three weeks, 6,220 Afghans have been repatriated to their home country.
The minister’s announcement comes in the context of Pakistan’s long history of managing Afghan refugees. Between 2002 and 2005, following the fall of the Taliban government in 2001, nearly three million Afghan refugees voluntarily returned to Afghanistan under a program facilitated by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
In 2016, under the National Action Plan, Pakistan initiated a large-scale repatriation of Afghan refugees, resulting in 370,000 Afghans returning to Afghanistan and 800,000 being issued Afghan Citizen Cards.
