RASC News Agency: The mass deportation of Afghanistani refugees from Pakistan has intensified sharply in the aftermath of the failed negotiations between Taliban representatives and Pakistani authorities in Turkey. The breakdown of these talks originally intended to establish a cooperative
framework for the “voluntary return” of refugees has instead unleashed a new wave of arrests, harassment, and expulsions, thrusting thousands of Afghanistani families into renewed fear and homelessness.
The federal government of Pakistan, particularly in the province of Punjab, has instructed law enforcement agencies to identify, detain, and deport all Afghanistani nationals without valid residency permits. Local sources report that alongside this directive, authorities have banned property owners from renting homes, hotel rooms, or any other accommodation to Afghanistani citizens. The order, described by rights observers as both “cruel and discriminatory,” has rendered entire communities invisible and defenceless people with nowhere to hide and no legal recourse to remain.
In Lahore, Rawalpindi, and Faisalabad, police raids have intensified over the past week. Witnesses describe heavily armed security personnel moving from house to house, demanding identification papers and detaining anyone without documentation including refugees awaiting visa renewals or resettlement approvals.
“Our lives have been completely destroyed,” said Hameed, an Afghanistani refugee in Lahore. “Police come to every street, break into homes, and take people away. Even those with pending visa extensions are dragged out. Our children sleep outside because we are too afraid to stay indoors. Every knock on the door feels like the end.”
The campaign has sparked outrage among human rights groups. Izzatullah Bakhshi, a Kabul-based rights activist currently in exile, told RASC:
“The situation has deteriorated drastically since the failure of the Taliban-Pakistan talks in Turkey. Instead of finding a humanitarian solution, Pakistan has resorted to collective punishment while the Taliban remain deafeningly silent. The victims are ordinary Afghanistani families many of whom fled precisely because of Taliban oppression.”
Analysts point out that the timing of Pakistan’s crackdown is no coincidence. Islamabad halted the extension of Afghanistani visas six months ago, leaving thousands of refugees including journalists, former civil servants, women’s rights defenders, and ex-security personnel in legal limbo. The Taliban’s inability or unwillingness to negotiate any protection for their citizens abroad has deepened their image as an isolated and incompetent regime.
Despite the mass detentions, the Taliban leadership has made no meaningful statement or diplomatic appeal. Their silence, analysts argue, is not merely negligence it is complicity. While thousands of Afghanistani men, women, and children are rounded up in Pakistan, the Taliban’s rulers in Kabul remain preoccupied with enforcing dress codes, closing girls’ schools, and consolidating their own ethnic dominance within the regime.
“The Taliban claim to be the guardians of an Islamic nation,” said a political analyst in Islamabad, “but they cannot even defend the dignity of their people beyond their borders. Their silence exposes a truth the world already suspects: the Taliban’s rule is not about faith or sovereignty it is about power and submission.”
For Afghanistani refugees, life in Pakistan has become unbearable. With the Torkham border closed for much of the day and heavily guarded by Pakistani troops, escape has become nearly impossible. Families that once hoped for resettlement in safer countries now find themselves trapped in a cycle of fear unwanted in Pakistan and abandoned by the Taliban regime they fled.
“We are prisoners without walls,” said another refugee. “Everywhere we go, we are hunted. The Taliban claim Afghanistan is free, but their freedom has no place for us.”
Human rights observers warn that the ongoing deportations could precipitate a humanitarian catastrophe along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, where tens of thousands of returnees face famine, persecution, and unemployment. With winter approaching and no international framework for refugee protection, many could face death upon return.
Yet, even as this crisis unfolds, the Taliban’s officials continue their propaganda of “national stability” in Kabul speaking from air-conditioned offices, while millions of Afghanistani citizens at home and abroad suffer the consequences of their isolationist rule.
The tragedy of the Afghanistani refugees in Pakistan thus stands as a stark symbol of what Afghanistan has become under the Taliban: a nation abandoned by its rulers, betrayed by its supposed defenders, and left voiceless in a region increasingly indifferent to its suffering.
