Better late than never; Pakistan has aptly made the decision to secure its vital national interests by returning illegal immigrants to their homeland. Pakistan’s Comprehensive national security is compromised with the presence of illegal immigrants. A state is duly recognized and acknowledged worldwide if it protects and treats its citizens well. Pakistan has been a generous home to more than 3 million refugees out of which only 1.4 million are registered while the rest are undocumented illegal immigrants including many Afghan refugees. The issue of deporting illegal immigrants is not a new phenomenon but has been on implementation strategy for a long time. It prompted with an abrupt surge in the acts of terrorism in Pakistan. Pakistan’s comprehensive national security has been compromised with the presence of illegal immigrants which paved the way for implementation of deportation plan of refugees. Pakistan respects its refugees but do not own the policy of keeping its own citizens at the suffering end. A state affirms to the social contract with its citizens by ensuring them security at first and everything else later.

The national security perspective of Pakistan reveals state concerns about the potential infiltration of militants or extremist elements among the refugee population. On 3^rd of October 2023, the caretaker government of Pakistan has announced a mass deportation of undocumented and illegal immigrants residing within Pakistan. The decision came about with the consensus of top leadership of the country. This immediate strategy is the part of concerns about terrorist activities being orchestrated and sheltered within refugee communities. The outlawed TTP launched more than 300 terrorist attacks in KPK alone which brought a staunch policy shift of Pakistan towards refugees. The security forces discovered that out of 24, 14 were Afghan nationals involved and abetted terrorist attacks in KPK and Balochistan. Afghan Taliban officially negate their support to TTP but taking no measures against them. This reflects that allowing refugees without legal documents and defined refugee status, pose grave security risks to Pakistan and its stability.

In the light of international law, the principle of non-refoulement forms an essential protection under international human rights, refugee, humanitarian and customary law. Article 3 (1) of 1951 Refugee Convention applies to this case which prohibit States from transferring or removing individuals from their jurisdiction when there are substantial grounds for believing that the person would be at risk of irreparable harm upon return, including persecution, torture, ill treatment or other serious human rights violations. Viewing the humanitarian situation and political turmoil of Afghanistan, the world is raising eye-brows to Pakistan for deporting Afghan refugees deeming it violation of international law. However, there exist two exceptions to the principle of non-refoulment. One favors the exodus of illegal immigrants and refugees only when they emanate serious national security threat to the host country while other allows deportation in case the refugees pose any danger to the citizens of host country. Indeed, both the exceptions favor Pakistan in deporting illegal immigrants.

Pakistan is making use of the interim government which has no special mandate to follow but advances previous policies in the right direction. Almost every government in the past have planned out of expelling these refugees but could not due to political pressures having tilt towards specific ethnic communities. The deportation is although a forced displacement yet it is not a haste business. Now, Pakistan is emboldened and adamant to make this move during the interim government although with no mandate yet trying to make right choices for Pakistan. Now, it is enacting its policy of deportation systematically and in subsequent phases. The exodus is a hustle-free event which is taking place gradually in three different phases. According to official data, more than 400,000 Afghans have left Pakistan already and remaining are in progress.

Pakistan must act on realist grounds for securing its vital national interests but along with some legal and ethical considerations. It has reiterated that the registered Afghans need not to worry as they will not be part of anti-migration drive while doing otherwise. The fact that deportation of illegal immigrants is a necessary evil but should not treat refugees with proper refugee status having Proof of Registration Card (PoR) as illegals. It will ultimately damage not only state-state relations with Afghanistan but also deepen distrust and hatred among Afghan population for Pakistan.

The migrants have affected Pakistan both ways; positively, they contributed to the revenue generation while negatively, they have posed serious security threats and become a burden on the already limited resources of Pakistan. According to UN report, they have carried out a survey in five cities of Pakistan; Quetta, Harripur, Attock, Peshawar and Islamabad to quantify Afghan nationals’ participation and contribution to the economy of Pakistan. They work in almost every sector of Pakistan and among huge piles of garbage to collect material for recycling and trading purposes. However, one cannot overlook the harms to security and peace, caused by unregistered refugees involved in terrorist activities.

Pakistan is forcibly returning these refugees to their home country as their presence have burdened the socio-economic structures of Pakistan but the policy and its implementation failures of the government of Pakistan to keep these refugees in refugee camps or villages have played a leading role in it.  The repatriation strategy has become necessary for Pakistan as it is facing fragile economy with bleak economic prospects, political insecurity, administrative issues and not to mention reemergence of terrorism which is attributed to the migrants. In such circumstances, provision of basic necessities to non-citizens has become a tedious task for the government of Pakistan.

The economic security of Pakistan is compromised somehow as Kabul fell to Taliban. With the rise of Taliban, Afghanistan became short of dollars due to the world’s unacceptability and non-recognition. A state largely dependent on foreign aid for survival became victim of frozen assets- already weakened state economy became worse from bad. Since Pakistan is notorious for some illegal practices; the dollar smuggling from Pakistan’s bordering areas inhabited by migrants and hoarding in Afghanistan started threatening the status of Pakistani rupee and economic security of Pakistan. Moreover, due to maladministration we let them inhabit and occupy the places they willed. It turned out that the infrastructures, residencies and economic structures are overloaded with Afghan nationals and refugees, creating hardships for locals.

Moreover, U.S. has advocated Pakistan not to deport such Afghans who have applied for Special Immigration Visa Program in USA. It is buying more time for cross-checking their identities and completion of immigration process at the cost of Pakistan’s security landscape. Approximately, more than 150,000 Afghans have applied for SIVs out of which almost 11,000 have got their visas in 2022 the rest are in waiting queue; challenging to Pakistan’s current situation.

Pakistan embraces brotherhood and want to have cordial relations with Afghanistan or any other Muslim state but not at the cost of its own security. International pressures could not change its strict policy this time as it has learnt lessons from 21^st century’s set realist paradigm and blunders in the past while considering return of refugees to their home would be right choice for its security and socio-economic betterment. Pakistan acknowledges serious implications of its adamant move, as it will further sore relations with Afghanistan. However; the question arises whether deporting refugees and illegal immigrants from Pakistan would eliminate its biggest threat TTP from Pakistan and solve the problem of security?