Has Imran Khan delivered an inswinger at Pakistan military?
Wednesday, September 19, 2018 IST
NEW DELHI: Recently sworn-in prime minister Imran Khan said Pakistan would grant citizenship to all Afghan and Bangladeshi refugees born in the country.
Pakistan is home to over 1.39 million UNHCR-registered Afghan refugees and more than 200,000 ethnic Bangladeshis, including many Rohingya. UN surveys suggest that around 60% of Afghan refugees were either born in Pakistan or were minors when their parents migrated to Pakistan.
This is a marked departure from the country’s previous stand wherein it saw the refugees as unwelcome and has consistently pushed Afghanistan for repatriation. In fact, only a day earlier, Khan’s foreign minister had "underlined the need for dignified, sustainable repatriation of Afghan refugees to their homeland through a gradual and time-bound plan”.
Pakistan military, which has been fighting Pakistan Taliban — comprising Afghan natives — has been particularly against giving rights to the refugees. Human Rights Watch reports that the security establishment’s harassment of Afghan refugees had spiked since the Pak Taliban’s attack on Peshawar's Army Public School in 2014 that killed more than 140 — many children of soldiers.
Thus, Khan’s announcement in Karachi came as a surprise to many. Has the military changed its stance or has PM Khan truly become politician Khan, for there is a political play here. Citizenship to Afghans could benefit Khan’s PTI, as many of them are Pashtuns, and Pashtuns in Pakistan had supported PTI.
By embracing Bangladeshis and Afghans, Khan also gets to project himself above other Islamic parties in the assembly, many of whom have their own “vote banks”; granting the refugees citizenship would help Khan's claim as the leader of all.
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