The decision to deport Afghans has been widely welcomed by the public. This is an unfortunate fact that Afghanistan brings only bad news to Pakistan and Pak-Afghan borders bring nothing good except drugs, terrorism, radicalization, sectarian killings, poliovirus, and a dirty money market. Afghanis are brutally looting the resources of the host country, wreaking havoc in Pakistan’s economy, and they are directly involved in terrorism in Pakistan.
The credit goes to the sitting civil and military leadership for deciding between sending Afghans back to their land. This long-awaited decision to protect Pakistan’s economy and society from Afghans has been taken because the foremost responsibility of the state of Pakistan is towards its Pakistani population, their lives and property are the most important, not the people of any other countries who have become a great threat to the lives and property of Pakistanis.
Pakistan’s management of the Afghan refugee crisis represents one of the most complex humanitarian and security challenges in South Asia. The presence of 3.7 million Afghan refugees (official figure while unofficial figure is around 20 million) has created multifaceted pressures on Pakistan’s national infrastructure, from border security to economic resources. Security concerns remain paramount, particularly with increased cross-border militant activities and strain on law enforcement capabilities. The economic burden also continues to stretch Pakistan’s public resources beyond sustainable limits.
Afghans are exposed
In the early 80s, the most popular debate moved around the subject of the consequences of the State’s decision to open gates for flooding Afghan Jihadis and Afghan refugees who were encroaching social norms under the state-sponsored narrative of “Muhajirin and Insar”. Within the next three decades, everybody realized that Muhajirin made Pakistan a radicalized, intolerant society equipped with sophisticated weapons and drugs. It became evident by the year 2000 that the experiment of inviting Afghans was too expensive economically as well as socially. Some sane voices had loudly and fearlessly been questioning and criticizing the urbanization of Afghan refugees, but such voices got deaf ears. In the last 45 years, Afghans had ruined the social fabric of Pakistani society, they had no respect for womanhood and are against the education and wellbeing of the female cadre of society. Sending Afghans back to their land is quite a complex issue because:
Legal and illegal Afghan refugees residing in Pakistan since 1979, Afghan Jihad had multiplied over 20 million from three million (1979 official figure).
The government of Pakistan never took holistic action against registered/unregistered Afghan refugees during the last 45 years, and they have been allowed to stay in Pakistan due to UNHCR requests.
Social Integration issue
Afghanis have not integrated themselves with Pakistani society, and culture, and they consider their customs more important than Pakistani laws and Pakistani customs. They share a nomadic/tribal culture with different sets of rules based on their own shared history and cultural values. The innate dislike towards the agrarian culture doesn’t let them assimilate with Pakistan.
This is also an important factor to understand that Afghans are deeply connected to their social belief system, that any kind of social and cultural integration with Pakistan means leaving their ways of life. The unwillingness to adapt and opt for the agrarian culture created Afghan ghettos across Pakistan, where Afghans in sub-societies are living by their norms and traditions, resulting in Pakistan being just a land of opportunity to exploit. It is also understood that Afghans do not consider Pakistan as their motherland, so just use Pakistan for their economic gains.
Façade of Pak-Afghan brotherhood
The majority of population of Middle East is Muslims and they share Muslim brotherhood culture, but cannot visit without a valid visa to other visiting country, cannot do business in the foreign country (within the Middle East) without legal documentation, and cannot overstay in the host country if their visa is expired.
The entire façade of Pak-Afghan brotherhood was created on religion that was contrary to what other Muslim countries follow. Furthermore, sociologists and anthropologists believe that religion is never a pre-requisite for a motherland and nationhood. The concept of motherland is based on emotional and symbolic significance, which can have spiritual dimensions. The term is used for ancestral land and goes beyond mere physical and political boundaries. The ancestral roots of Pakistani culture and oral history are not aligned at any layer with Afghans. The idea of them integrating into urban Pakistan was utopian, bringing negative results.
The Economic Cost since 1979
Several post-Afghan Jihad researches indicate that since 1979, economic growth has not picked up and Pakistan continues to be a serious victim of terrorism, including foreign-sponsored terrorism from the immediate neighborhoods. There is no doubt that Pakistan fought back and reclaimed its writ in troubled areas bordering Afghanistan through several military operations against terrorists from 2003 to 2018 but almost everything went down to drain when the PTI government through a negotiation with terrorists resettled TTP terrorists inside the country after Afghan Taliban reclaimed government in Kabul in August 2021.
Since 1979, a considerable portion of valuable national resources, both men and material, have been diverted to address the security challenges, and in addition to economic losses, cross-border terrorism in Pakistan.
The economic cost that Pakistan has paid since the Afghan Jihad is undocumented for several reasons. Two of the core reasons were that Pakistan had no expertise to conduct researches that could cover the period between 1979-1988 and the second fundamental reason was the state’s decision to put the issue under the carpet because Pakistan did not want to share with its citizens the horrific economic and social impact of Afghan Jihad over Pakistan.
In 2016, the Finance Division of the Government of Pakistan first time shared the economic impact of the conflict and instability in Afghanistan in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and their regional implications.
This report documented the financial impact of the US-led War on Terror over Pakistan, which was over 9,860 billion Pak rupees. Since 2016, no credible document has been released about what immense negative consequences the War on Terror has for Pakistan. After the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, Pakistan again saw a huge influx of Afghan refugees and a sudden rise in the number and scale of terrorist attacks in the country. The cumulative impact of these developments adversely compressed the overall growth rate in all major sectors of Pakistan’s economy.
The official document of the Finance Division confirmed that normal economic and trading activities were disrupted, resulting in higher costs of doing business and significant delays in meeting export orders around the globe. As a result, Pakistani products gradually lost their market share. Since 1979, a considerable portion of valuable national resources, both men and material, have been diverted to address the security challenges, and in addition to economic losses, cross-border terrorism in Pakistan has also been responsible for untold human sufferings due to indiscriminate, brutal terrorist attacks against the civilian population and men in uniform.
Another report claims that an illegal parallel economy like Hawala and Hundi is solely operated by citizens of Afghanistan sitting abroad, from where they send money to Pakistan through Hawala and Hundi, and they encourage Pakistanis living abroad not to use banking channels for the transfer of money, thereby Pakistani remittances are nosediving. Forex market sources claim that US dollar smuggling is 100 percent in the hands of Citizens of Afghanistan who are transferring US$ from Pakistan to Afghanistan, and this factor is stabilizing the economy of Afghanistan and destabilizing Pakistan’s economy.
The report indicated that Afghans buy coal and other commodities in Afghan currency and sell them in Pakistani currency with some profit, later they convert Pakistani rupees into US dollars and send them to Afghanistan. This illegal outflow of US dollars from Pakistan has reduced foreign reserves in Pakistan and increased pressure on the rupee, with the domestic currency falling to record lows and the economy teetering on the brink of collapse.
The economic implications of hosting Afghan refugees have placed unprecedented strain on Pakistan’s financial resources, with recent estimates indicating a cost of PKR 610.90 billion over three years for managing the current refugee population. The influx has significantly stressed Pakistan’s public infrastructure, particularly in border regions where essential services are already scarce and limited. Key impact areas include: Healthcare facilities operating at 175% capacity in refugee-dense areas; educational institutions accommodating 26 million out-of-school children, including half a million refugee children; water and sanitation systems requiring substantial upgrades to meet increased demand; and housing shortages in urban areas driving up rental costs. It is worth mentioning that polio eradication campaigns also face resistance in Afghan refugee housing colonies as the population is averse to administering polio drops to their young ones.
The Political and Economic Manipulation
Whenever Pakistan’s government tried to send Afghans back to their country, religious organizations, political parties, and corrupt bureaucrats dealing with Afghan Refugees organizations stood with Afghans and frustrated attempts of the government to send Afghans back to Afghanistan.
It may be due to the vote-bank of religious parties because millions of Afghans have bought/procured Pakistani identification cards and passports illegally, and they may be registered voters supporting religious parties. Besides, illegal Afghans studying in Madrasas (religious schools) are a major street force of religiopolitical parties for street protests whenever necessary.
Another possible reason is purely economic as many important political leaders are directly or indirectly involved in Afghan-transit trade that generates billions of rupees annually. The checks and balances on Afghan transit trade can play havoc with their illegal businesses (Afghanis consider smuggling a legal business and call it Karobar. Hundi, Hawala, weapon trade, etc, are businesses, not anything illegal for them). Therefore, any action against illegal Afghans crossing the Pak-Afghan border does not suit the powerful strata of KPK society.
Economic Terrorism and Afghans
Several International researches indicate that Financial Terrorism (also known as Economic Terrorism) is a secret manipulation of a nation’s economy by state or non-state actors. Terroristic attacks against ports and land borders (attacks in and around Gwadar Port, and Karachi Port) cause extra measures to be implemented to ensure the safe arrival and departure of the products, and these measures force the cost of exporting and importing goods to increase. Pakistan is the most affected by this kind of terrorism since 2021. Economic Terrorism has been an innovative attempt to destabilize Pakistan by hoarding US currency, massive smuggling of edible oil to Afghanistan, and creating a food security situation within Pakistan. Here is a need to understand what Economic Terrorism is?
In 2005 the Geneva Centre for Security Policy defined Economic Terrorism in the following terms:
“Contrary to “economic warfare” which is undertaken by states against other states, “economic terrorism” would be undertaken by transnational or non-state actors. This could entail varied, coordinated, and sophisticated or massive destabilizing actions to disrupt the economic and financial stability of a state, a group of states, or a society for ideological or religious motives. These actions, if undertaken, may be violent or not. They could have either immediate effects or psychological effects, which in turn have economic consequences”.
The Economic Terrorism impacts are:
- Immediate Loss of Human and Nonhuman Capital.
- Effects of Uncertainty on Consumer and Investor Behavior.
- Effects of Retrenchment on Specific Industries or Localities.
- Increased costs of security analogous to a “security” or “terrorist tax”.
- Impact on supply chains.
- Smuggling of currency for bleeding the country economically.
- Smuggling of edible products to create a serious food security in the target country.
- Encouraging the undocumented economy.
- Controlling routes for disrupting supply chains.
- Attacking and harassing local and foreign investors (reference attacks on Chinese experts and ransom threats to industrialists, businessmen, and traders in Pakistan).
The Security Issues
Afghanistan is sheltering the Khawarij sect, and this Khawarij sect is spreading terrorism in Pakistan, rather Afghanistan has again become a home of global terrorists. Terrorist outfits like Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Daesh Khorasan, Al-Qaida and other extremist groups are living there and operating against Pakistan and Central Asian countries and even against Russia.
There is clear evidence of the involvement of Afghan terrorists in the growing terrorism in Pakistan, after which the Ministry of Interior has had to take this most important decision. The evidence has proven that Afghan residents living here illegally facilitate terrorists coming from Afghanistan. On March 4, 2025, the Khwaraj attacked Bannu Cantt, which was foiled by the Pakistan Army and security forces, sacrificing five soldiers, and killing all 16 terrorists. Most of these 16 have been proven to be from Afghanistan, and evidence has also emerged that this attack was fully prepared on Afghan soil under the umbrella of the Afghan interim government.
Recent statistics paint a grim picture. According to the Institute for Conflict and Security Studies (ICPS), Pakistan recorded 517 terrorist attacks in 2023, but this number surged to 1,099 in 2024, marking a 112% increase within a year. These attacks have primarily targeted security personnel, civilians, and government installations, leading to significant casualties and a growing sense of insecurity across the country.
The most affected regions remain Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and Balochistan, where militant activities have intensified. Reports from the Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies (PIPS) highlight a 174% increase in terrorist incidents in KP in 2023, while Balochistan. One of the primary factors behind this resurgence is the return of the Taliban in Afghanistan. Since the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul in August 2021, terrorist organizations have found safe havens across the border, regrouping and launching attacks inside Pakistan. Terrorist incidents in border areas have increased by 80%, indicating weak border control and the persistent challenge of cross-border infiltration. The Center for Research and Security Studies (CRSS) reported that in just January and February 2024, 685 security personnel were killed, marking an alarming 120% increase compared to the previous year. These numbers underscore the urgent need for Pakistan to reassess its counterterrorism policies and regional security strategies. Balochistan, already a volatile region, has witnessed a surge in insurgent activities, with groups like the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) carrying out high-profile attacks. In April 2024, an attack near Quetta resulted in the martyrdom of 12 security personnel, while a suicide bombing in Gwadar claimed the lives of five individuals, including Chinese engineers. Such attacks not only pose a direct threat to national security but also endanger the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a vital economic initiative for Pakistan’s future. The escalation in violence suggests that terrorist groups are not only targeting security forces but are also attempting to destabilize key economic projects, creating long-term security and economic challenges for the country.
