‘Leaders of some repatriated families arrested by Pakistani Police’

JALALABAD (Pajhwok): The leaders of some families who have returned from Pakistan had been arrested by Pakistani police and sent to jails, an official said on Sunday.

They said kids or their relatives had to bear responsibility for these families and they had been going through immense difficulties.

Sajjad, 9, is one of the kids whose father had been arrested in Pakistan and he had to look after his family when he himself is a kid.

He waited in the queue for registration at a temporary camp in Torkham Township.

He even did not know how to respond but moved his head to Pajhwok reporter and said he was missing his father.

Aminullah, from the Khogyano district of Nangarhar province, retuned to Afghanistan one week earlier and said he was arrested by Pakistani police and his family returned to Afghanistan without him.

He added: “I came here six days earlier, I was stopped at Torkham because I did not have Refugee Card, my wife and other family members had refugees card so they were allowed but I was taken to Landi Kotal jail and then to another jail where I spent 17 days then I was deported from Torkham.”

Local officials also acknowledged in 100 families eight families leaders are arrested by Pakistani police.

Sidiqullah Qureshi, deputy head of the Nangarhar Information and Cultural Affairs Department, said the registration biometric process of people returning from Pakistan was moving at high speed.

So far more than 150,000 people have returned to Afghanistan from Pakistan via Torkham crossing.

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