Imran pledges citizenship to Afghan, Bangladeshi refugees

The Pakistan government will grant nationality to all Pakistan-born refugees of Afghan and Bangladeshi origins, report Aljazeera.com.

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan said this during his maiden visit to Karachi on Sunday after forming the government.

Pakistan is home to more than 1.39 million registered Afghan refugees, according to United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), many of whom have been resident in the country for more than 30 years. There are also more than 200,000 ethnic Bangladeshis in Pakistan, most of whom live in the southern city of Karachi.

Many of them were stranded in the city after the war in 1971 when Bangladesh, then East Pakistan, gained independence.

In a surprise announcement on Sunday at a public event in Karachi, the Pakistani prime minister said: "Afghans whose children have been raised and born in Pakistan will be granted citizenship inshallah (God willing) because this is the established practice in countries around the world. "They are humans. How come we have deprived them and have not arranged for offering them national identification card and passport for 30 years, 40 years?"

Afghan refugees, meanwhile, have poured into Pakistan from its western neighbour for decades, first fleeing the Soviet invasion in the 1970s, and then the civil war that ensued.