ISLAMABAD: Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Asim Munir on Thursday endorsed the government’s decision to launch a deportation drive against unregistered foreigners in Pakistan, calling them a threat to the country’s security and saying the repatriation process was being carried out in a dignified way.
The government announced in October to expel “illegal migrants,” mostly Afghans, following a string of extremist attacks and suicide bombings in Pakistan which were blamed on a proscribed militant network, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), whose leadership is said to be based in Afghanistan.
While the Pakistani authorities did not say they were exclusively targeting Afghans, they maintained there was evidence that Afghan nationals in the country were involved in organized crime and had carried out 14 out of 24 suicide bombings since January this year.
According to the military’s media wing, ISPR, the army chief received a detailed briefing on the overall security situation, including the ongoing counterterrorism operations and deportation of foreigners, during his visit to Peshawar in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province.
“Illegal foreigners were seriously affecting Pakistan’s security and economy,” he maintained during his visit. “Decision to repatriate them has been taken by the government in the interest of Pakistan. Illegal foreigners are being repatriated to their countries in a humane and dignified manner as per the established norms.”
International rights organizations have criticized the arrests and deportation of Afghan nationals by Pakistani authorities in recent weeks amid harassment complaints by registered refugees.
The army chief praised the people of KP for their “resolute support” to the security force, saying it had resulted in stability in the province and materialization of progress on projects of socio-economic development.
“Nation takes pride and acknowledges the accomplishments of its Armed Forces,” he added. “Pakistan is destined to succeed and Pakistan Army will continue to undertake its selfless and sacred duty of safeguarding every inch of the motherland till last drop of blood.”
He also learned about the socio-economic developments of the country’s erstwhile tribal territories along the northwestern border with Afghanistan that witnessed a lot of volatility in the wake of the post-9/11 international invasion of the region and that have frequently complained about being underdeveloped.
The tribal belt, which acted as a buffer zone separating Pakistan from Afghanistan, was merged with the rest of the KP province in 2018, though it still requires plenty of funds for its development.
Army chief backs deportation drive, says illegal foreigners ‘seriously affecting’ Pakistani security, economy
https://arab.news/matcj
Army chief backs deportation drive, says illegal foreigners ‘seriously affecting’ Pakistani security, economy
- General Asim Munir says the repatriation process is taking place ‘in a humane and dignified manner’
- The army chief also inquires about the socio-economic development of the erstwhile tribal territories
Evictees of slum near Islamabad’s diplomatic quarter claim abandonment as city cites security, illegal settlement
- Authorities say evictees were compensated in the early 2000s, settlement built later illegally
- Evictees, for whom historical and emotional costs outweigh legal arguments, say they feel abandoned
ISLAMABAD: Muzaffar Hussain Shah bends down, picks up a brick from the rubble and cleans it with a hammer. Until a few weeks ago, the brick had been part of a home where Shah had lived for nearly five decades, since his birth.
The house in an informal settlement in Islamabad, which came to be known as Muslim Colony, was demolished in an anti-encroachment drive. Shah said he has spent past three weeks sleeping under the open sky and has been collecting the last remaining bricks to get by for a few more days.
Shah, 48, is one of nearly 15,000 people evicted by the Capital Development Authority (CDA) from the settlement, which was established in the 1960s to house laborers who built Pakistan’s capital of Islamabad, during a drive that began in November.
The decades-old settlement, located near the prime minister’s official residence and the Diplomatic Enclave, a specially designated area within the city that houses foreign embassies, high commissions and international missions, has now been reduced to a 712-kanal (89-acre) stretch of dust and debris.
“It feels as if there is neither a sky over our heads nor anyone behind our backs,” Shah told Arab News on Tuesday, surrounded by the rubble of his demolished home. “Nor is there anything ahead of us. We cannot see anything at all.”
While evacuated residents recount a tale of what they described as broken political promises and affiliation with the place, authorities say there were “obviously security concerns”, and that claims to the land were settled two decades ago.
During an interview with Arab News, Dr. Anam Fatima, director of municipal administration at the Islamabad Metropolitan Corporation, showed satellite images of the “informal settlement” from 2002.
The images showed significant population growth over the years, which she said indicated that most current residents arrived after 2002, when the government negotiated the resettlement of original residents in return for compensation.
“In 2002, it was decided that these people will be compensated, and they were accordingly compensated,” Fatima said.
“Seven hundred and fifty [residents] were found eligible. They were given plots in Farash Town,” she said about a neighborhood on Islamabad’s outskirts. “Some of them moved, some of them did not, but the original settlement was not removed, unfortunately.”
The official attributed the survival of the settlement and its subsequent growth to “enforcement failure” and “changing policies” over the years, insisting that all legal formalities were met before the latest operation.
“Notices were given first to vacate and then after the evacuations had been done... people had completely moved their belongings, only then bulldozers were sent into the area,” Fatima said.
For the evacuated residents, the historical and emotional costs outweigh the legal arguments, they say. Many claim their families moved there more than six decades ago and were promised permanent housing in exchange for their labor.
Muhammad Hafeez, whose father arrived in 1972, lamented that the ones who had helped built Islamabad were being rewarded in the form of eviction from the same city.
“Allah will definitely question you about this,” he said.
Muhammad Khalil, 62, another evictee, blamed CDA officials for allowing the settlement not just to exist but also to grow over the years.
“We did not bring these houses down from space and place them here. CDA officials were present here, they were aware of the developments taking place every single minute, every moment,” he said.
“Their vehicles would come daily. We built these houses right in front of them.”
As bulldozers cleared the land this month, many residents of Muslim Colony said they felt abandoned by the city they once helped build.
“All of this Islamabad that has been built was built by our elders,” Shah said. “Laborers used to live here. And today, after having built Islamabad, today, we have become illegal.”
Authorities, however, say the evictees had been residing illegally and had been compensated, maintaining that they had to be relocated.
“It was entirely illegal because whatever right that they had, it was already compensated in 2003 by the authority,” Dr. Fatima said.
