Pakistan’s Foreign Minister, Jalil Abbas Jilani has defended an order requiring all illegal immigrants, including 1.73 million Afghans, to leave the country, claiming that no other country admits illegal immigrants and that the action follows international practice.
The order, issued with a deadline of November 1 for people to leave, has strained relations with Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers, who have called the threat to drive Afghan migrants out “unacceptable.”
In an interview with Hong Kong’s Phoenix TV on the margins of a seminar in Tibet, the Minister in a caretaker Pakistani Government, Jalil Abbas Jilani, said: “No country allows illegal people to live in their country, whether it is Europe, whether it is countries in Asia, in our neighborhood.
“So, accordingly, this is in line with the international practice that we have taken this decision.”
Pakistan has been a refuge for people fleeing from war in Afghanistan since the 1970s.
According to Pakistan’s interior minister, 1.73 million Afghans in Pakistan do not have legal documentation, while the country has 4.4 million Afghan refugees.
So the Pakistani government has made a decision,” Jilani added, stressing that the situation in Afghanistan had stabilized.
