PM Imran gives instructions to open accounts of registered Afghan refugees
February 25, 2019
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan instructed on Monday to open bank accounts of the Afghan refugees registered in the country.
The PM in a tweet on social media said that from now on the refugees can participate in the formal economy of the country.
“This should have been done a long time ago,” wrote the prime minister.
Shortly after assuming charge, PM Imran Khan had announced in a ceremony to grant citizenship to 1.5 million Afghan refugees, who have resided in Pakistan.
Pakistan is one of the largest refugee-hosting nations in the world, home to an estimated 2.4 million registered and undocumented people who have fled Afghanistan, some as far back as the Soviet invasion of 1979.
Under Pakistan's constitution, anyone born in the country after 1951 has the right to citizenship. But feeling against the refugees is so strong that no leader has dared take moves to implement the policy — PM Khan's promise was the first time any Pakistani premier has made such a vow.
The United Nations says there are 1.4 million Afghans registered as refugees in Pakistan, and estimates that some 74 percent were born there.
