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Pakistan authority trains Afghan refugees to be self reliant

By Linus Aleke
The Government of Pakistan, in collaboration with non-profit organizations, have created many livelihood opportunities through the provision of access to market-oriented training which led to economic uplift for Afghan refugees and their host communities, the High Commission of Pakistan in Abuja has said.

The High Commission, in a statement, said that the country is host to no fewer than 1.3 million registered Afghan refugees.

It further disclosed that many of the refugees in Pakistan run small businesses or do petty jobs and send remittances to their family members who remain across the border.

The statement also revealed that other than a few exceptions, many settled Afghan refugees acknowledge that Pakistan is their home and that local people are friendly.

According to the statement, “Since 1979, Pakistan is hosting millions of Afghan refugees even though Pakistan is neither a signatory to the UN Convention relating to the status of refugees, the Geneva Convention, nor to the Protocol relating to the status of refugees of 31 January 1967. Given the traditional mixed nature of cross-border movement in the region, Pakistan also hosts documented and undocumented Afghans who left their country in search of economic opportunity or access to basic services.

“Unlike refugee practices in other regional and western host communities, the majority of Afghan refugees in Pakistan reside in urban and semi-urban areas outside of refugee villages and settlements relying on national public service that is available to them.

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“Despite, its challenges and the need of their population, Pakistan has upheld its international protection obligations and pursued non-discretionary policies toward Afghan refugees, notably in the areas of education, health care, and human capital development”.

The statement added that Pakistan’s progressive approach is further evident in the inclusion of Afghan refugees in the government’s national response plan to the COVID pandemic, including vaccination, a service denied to the majority of refugees in many European countries.

“Pakistan’s undeterred hosting of almost 1.3 million registered Afghan refugees is an unparalleled shouldering of a large share of the world’s collective responsibility to protect them,” the statement concluded.

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