Illegal aliens to be housed in camps till expulsion

IG asks police to ensure peaceful completion of process

LAHORE:

The illegal immigrants will be evicted from Punjab in phases through specified exit points and will be held in special camps till the process is completed.

Tuesday was the deadline for illegal residents to voluntarily leave the country.

Issuing instructions during a meeting in this regard to the regional, district and city police officers, Punjab IG Dr Usman Anwar

Anwar said the transport, logistics, food and other arrangements for the illegal migrants would be the responsibility of the respective district administration.

He said a security high alert should be maintained during the evacuation of the foreign nationals residing illegally in Punjab.

Read: Illegal migrants brace for action as deadline ends

The provincial police chief said the process should be completed in a peaceful environment.

The federal government had warned the illegal immigrants, especially Afghan nationals, in the first week of October to to leave immediately.

The government had vowed to take legal action to deport them to their country.

A survey conducted on the instructions of the government showed that there were 275,000 undocumented illegal Afghan national residents in Punjab.

About 88,000 of them possessed citizen’s cards and 186,000 had Proof of Residence Cards. Another 2,291 were marked as those who had returned from Afghanistan and put in the Fourth Schedule of suspects under the anti-terrorism laws, while 541 had been released from Afghan jails.

The police, in the second step, had marked and geo-tagged the hotspots where illegal immigrants were spotted.

In the third phase, the preparations were made to systematically organise the deportation of the large number of illegal immigrants.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 1^st, 2023.