KARACHI: Authorities in Pakistan’s southern Sindh province have denied media access to holding centers for illegal immigrants ahead of their deportation amid widespread complaints about the arrests and detention of registered refugees, journalists and refugee representatives said on Saturday.
Last month, Pakistan ordered all unregistered foreign nationals, primarily Afghans, to voluntarily repatriate by November 1, citing the involvement of many of them in militancy and other criminal activities. The government also established numerous holding centers to expedite the deportation following its ultimatum.
“At least 75 people have been detained and taken to a detention center, but 70 of them are registered refugees,” Haji Abdullah, chairman of the Afghan Refugee Council, said in an interview with Arab News.
He argued the refugees were apprehended despite having valid documents and questioned the law enforcement agencies’ rationale for detaining them even for verification purposes.
Pakistani authorities have repeatedly said they want to repatriate unregistered foreigners without undermining their dignity.
However, Hafeezullah Hasan, an Afghan national who came to Pakistan for medical treatment with a valid visa last month, reported that police had confiscated his passport.
“I legally traveled to Pakistan, and now I find myself at the police station awaiting the return of my passport,” he said.
Qaiser Khan Afridi, a spokesperson for the UN Refugee Agency, confirmed his organization had received harassment complaints from documented refugees in Sindh and other Pakistani regions.
“While the government of Pakistan’s plan targets the repatriation of undocumented foreigners in the first phase, we have reports of registered refugees with legal documentation being pressured,” he disclosed to Arab News.
Afridi urged authorities to avoid harassing refugees who are already encountering numerous hardships.
Journalists, including Ubaid Shah of a local news channel, were barred from entering the Sultanabad holding center in Karachi on Saturday.
“Making excuses that inmates may escape with media people, journalists were stopped at the gate,” Shah revealed. “This lack of access hinders our ability to report on the actual conditions.”
He also highlighted that media were not permitted on buses transporting refugees to the Afghan border for deportation.
“The authorities provide us with deportation numbers that frequently change,” he noted. “For example, on the first day, the deputy commissioner of the Keemari region reported that 120 people had been deported, but the figure was later adjusted to 112. Similarly, we were informed a day after that 148 people had left but then the figure was changed to 138.”
Shah maintained this pattern of changing numbers necessitated full media access for accurate and transparent reporting.
Faizullah Khan, another television journalist, shared similar experiences of being barred from the holding center.
“My colleagues and I were denied entry when we went to the center on the first day for reporting,” he said. “The reasons for this denial are unclear to us.”
Moniza Kakar, a lawyer and human rights advocate, said several detainees had been released following family protests.
“The authorities are detaining not only undocumented Afghans but also registered refugees, many of whom are children and Pakistani Pashtuns,” she informed.
Kakar called for increased transparency in the deportation process.
“We suspect that the authorities are concealing facts, given that documented refugees are also among those detained,” she added.
Attempts to get comments from the Karachi commissioner, the deputy commissioner of Keemari, and a spokesperson for the provincial home minister were unsuccessful, as none responded to calls.