100,000 Afghan refugees repatriated so far: UNHCR

PESHAWAR: The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has repatriated about 100,000 Afghan refugees to Afghanistan via Torkham border in the ongoing voluntary repatriation programme, an official said on Tuesday.

“About 100,000 Afghan individuals or more than 20,000 families have been verified at the Voluntary Repatriation Centre in Chamkani so far,” the spokesperson for UNCHR Qaiser Khan Afridi said.

“Since July last, there has been an increase in the voluntarily repatriation of registered Afghan refugees. And that is the reason that an average of 3,500 Afghans are returning every day from this centre alone,” he added.

He said that only in August, a total of 67,057 Afghan refugees had voluntarily repatriated to their homeland. “The majority of the returnees are going to Kabul, Nangarhar, Baghlan, Kunduz and Laghman provinces in Afghanistan,” he maintained.

The spokesman said the UNHCR had planned to open a new repatriation centre in Azakhel in Nowshera district after Eidul Azha to facilitate the Afghans refugees. He said that since July there has been an increase in the number of Afghans voluntarily repatriating to Afghanistan.

The official said that the UNHCR was playing a proactive role in the voluntary repatriation process. “At the Voluntary Repatriation Centre, we have provided all basic facilities to refugees like drinking water, Basic Health Unit, washrooms, fans and TV,” he maintained.

The spokesman added the UNHCR staff members were facilitating the repatriation process. He said that the documents of around 500 Afghan families were processed daily at the repatriation centre.

The proposed voluntary repatriation centre in Azakhel would also have the capacity to process the documents of 500 families daily, he added.During a visit to the UNHCR Voluntary Repatriation Centre in Chamkani on the outskirts of the provincial capital, a number of Afghan refugees were seen waiting for clearance to go back to Afghanistan.

An Afghan refugee, Attal Khan, 56, sporting pepper-and-salt beard said, “I have spent 36 years of my life here in Pakistan. I am happy because I am going back to my motherland. But I am worried too as I don’t know what will happen next. I am leaving good memories behind. I am thankful to Pakistan.” 

Waiting outside the card verification office, Gul Mohammad, 25, from the Kunduz province of Afghanistan said, “It’s good that we are going back. But we don’t know whether we will live at a camp or home in Afghanistan.”