Former Afghan FM Expresses Readiness to Cooperate with Taliban Regarding Migrants

In an interview with Afghanistan International, Bugti added that the purpose of this decision is to deport "foreigners" who do not have residence permits in Pakistan.

He stressed that the deportation of illegal immigrants is not limited to "one or two million Afghan nationals", but is a matter related to 220 million Pakistani citizens.

The interior minister of Pakistan added that according to the plan of the interim government of Pakistan, any foreigner who entered Pakistan illegally will be deported.

Bugti considered the decision to deport migrants to be somehow related to Pakistan's security issues and said that Afghan citizens were involved in 14 suicide attacks of 24 in Pakistan last year.

This Pakistani official emphasised that the decision was made to establish law and order in Pakistan and safeguard the interests of its people.

He also addressed speculation that the interim government of Pakistan might have made this decision to settle scores with the Taliban and said that they have no scores with the Taliban at all.

Bugti added that in his recent meeting with the Taliban ambassador in Islamabad, there was no request made to stop the deportation of the immigrants. Instead, the primary focus of their discussion was to "facilitate and expedite the repatriation" of immigrants from Pakistan to Afghanistan.

Recently, several Taliban officials have voiced their objections to Pakistan's decision, which has fuelled speculation that the Taliban may be opposed to Pakistan's stance.

Meanwhile, the Pakistani interior minister said that the group's ambassador in Islamabad did not make any request to reconsider the decision to deport the immigrants.

On October 3, Bugti announced the interim government's decision to deport undocumented immigrants and said that the deadline for voluntary departure would expire on November 1.

As per the interim government of Pakistan's announcement, there are approximately 1.7 million undocumented immigrants in the country, with the majority being Afghan citizens.

Alokozay told Afghanistan International that factories and cargo trucks are part of the confiscated assets.

"Four thousand containers of commercial goods remain in the Karachi port and similarly, the fate of 500 factories built by Afghans in Pakistan is not clear," he told Afghanistan International.

He added that the situation of 500 carpet weaving factories in Karachi and Quetta and about two thousand trucks of Afghan businessmen in Pakistan is still unclear.

Alokozay said that the total value of these factories and heavy vehicles reaches more than four billion dollars. He said that Afghans have a 30% share in the economic sector of Pakistan.

He asked the Taliban to start diplomatic efforts to extract the capital and return it to Afghanistan.

Mullah Hassan Akhund, the Taliban's Prime Minister, in a strong statement on Friday reacted to the confiscation of assets of Afghan immigrants and the destruction of their homes in Pakistan.

On Thursday, Zabihullah Mujahid, the spokesperson of the Taliban, referring to the confiscation of Afghans’ assets in Pakistan, said that no one has the right to seize the property and personal items of Afghans and that the country’s citizens can transfer their funds to their country according to the law.

On the other hand, Afghans who were forcibly deported from Pakistan say that in addition to their houses, livestock were left behind and the Pakistani police did not even allow them to move many of their personal belongings.

Although Pakistani officials have not said much about Afghan investment, on Thursday, the country's Interior Minister Sarfraz Bugti told a Pakistani media outlet that he is working on developing a strategy to determine the investment status of Afghan immigrants in Pakistan.

Pakistan has announced that more than 1.7 million immigrants without official residence documents live in the country and should leave Pakistan.

On Friday, Mullah Hassan Akhund reacted to the mass deportation of Afghan immigrants from Pakistan and asked the Pakistani government to stop putting pressure on the immigrants.

In a video clip published by the Taliban on X social media platform, the prime minister of the group read a strong statement against the new decision of the Pakistani government.

In this video clip, Mullah Hassan Akhund asks the Pakistani officials, “Who gave you the right to enter the homes of immigrants, humiliate them, and take their money from their pockets?”

In the speech, he asks, "Who are you to confiscate [immigrants'] property and assets?"

According to the Taliban’s prime minister, if Pakistani officials have problems with the government of the group, they should solve their problems through understanding and dialogue. In his speech, he emphatically invited the Pakistani officials to a dialogue to solve the problems.

This senior Taliban official said that if the Pakistani government claims that it is deporting "illegal immigrants", then in which law is there a place for destroying their houses, humiliating them, and confiscating their property.

He stressed, “No immigrant's life, property, and honour are safe now."

Mullah Hassan Akhund warned the Pakistani officials to think about their future and how "we will live together" with such behaviour.

The Taliban’s Prime Minister, who rarely appears in the media and usually does not take a public stance on political issues, has responded to Islamabad’s claim about the involvement of Afghans in Pakistan's recent instability.

Rejecting the claim, Mullah Hassan Akhund said that Afghans have lived in Pakistan for the past 45 years without creating any security challenges for Islamabad.

As the November 1 deadline of the Pakistani government for migrants to leave the country ended, Islamabad has put unprecedented pressure on the Afghan immigrant population in the country.

In the past few days, numerous reports of mistreatment, detention, and forced deportation of Afghan immigrants have been published in the media.

Pakistani officials said that only 19,744 Afghans returned to Afghanistan through the Torkham border on Thursday. Meanwhile, 147,944 Afghans returned to Afghanistan from Pakistan in the last month.

Pakistani officials said that the involvement of Afghan immigrants in attacks and cooperation with Islamist militants has weakened the country's security.

On Friday, Abdul Nasir Khan, deputy commissioner of Khyber district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province said, “Pakistan has opened 12 more border centres to speed up the repatriation of tens of thousands of Afghan citizens without residency documents, ignoring calls from refugee and human rights groups to reconsider the mass deportation programme.

Khan added that the facilities at the Torkham border crossing have been tripled to allow more Afghan immigrants to return to their country.

On November 1, the Pakistani government's one-month deadline for the voluntary return of Afghan refugees to their country ended, and the country intensified the process of arrest and forced deportation of these migrants.

Pakistani officials said that the main reason for the expulsion of Afghan refugees is the involvement of several Afghan immigrants in attacks by extremist Islamist militants in Pakistan, which has weakened the country's security. The Taliban have previously denied Islamabad’s claim.

Taliban officials in Kabul said that Pakistan's security is an internal problem and asked Islamabad to reconsider its decision.

Many Afghans sought refuge in different countries of the world, especially two neighbouring countries, Iran and Pakistan, in more than four decades of conflicts in Afghanistan.

According to the reports, with the return of the Taliban to power, more than 600,000 people have fled to Pakistan due to the Taliban's policies against human rights, especially women's rights.

Pakistani officials said that only 19,744 Afghans returned to Afghanistan through the Torkham border on Thursday. Meanwhile, 147,944 Afghans returned to Afghanistan from Pakistan in the last month.

Pakistani officials have said they will extend the deadline for Afghan patients and those who cannot travel from the country.

In an audio tape released by the Taliban, Mullah Yaqoob called the government of Pakistan a "regime".

In this six-and-a-half-minute audio file that was released on Friday, Yaqoob speaks about various aspects of the mass deportation of Afghan immigrants from Pakistan.

He called Pakistan's decision to deport Afghan immigrants a unilateral decision that is unacceptable to the Taliban government and said, "This is a cruel decision that was imposed on Afghans and has caused them problems."

In another part of his speech, the Taliban’s Defence Minister urged Pakistan not to oppress Afghans, take their personal property, or confiscate their properties.

Mullah Yaqoob stressed that Pakistan cannot confiscate the property of immigrants based on any law or principle.

The Taliban's defence minister emphasised on the group's commitment to prevent the confiscation of assets and properties of Afghan immigrants, vowing not to allow anyone to "steal the properties of our Afghan brothers" under any circumstances.

It seems that the fate of the properties and assets of Afghan immigrants following their expulsion from Pakistan is one of the disputed issues between the Pakistani government and the Taliban.

In a statement on Thursday, the Taliban embassy in Islamabad also announced that the group's ambassador had a meeting with the interior minister of the interim government of Pakistan and discussed the transfer of assets of Afghan refugees.

The details of these talks are not yet clear.