Over 400,000 Afghans illegally residing in Pak returned to homeland after crackdown: Taliban spokesman

Islamabad, Nov 20 (PTI) More than 400,000 Afghans living in Pakistan illegally have returned to their homeland since Islamabad last month announced a crackdown against immigrants residing in the country without any valid document, according to an official of the Taliban government in Afghanistan.

Pakistan in October announced to set November 1 as the date for unleashing a general crackdown on illegal aliens if they had not returned to their countries by then. As feared, the Afghans were the worst hit as more than 1.7 million of them had been living in Pakistan without valid documents. In an interaction with media persons in Kabul, Zabihullah Mujahid, spokesman for the Taliban-led government, said that so far over 400,000 Afghans living illegally in Pakistan have returned to their homeland.

Pakistan officials said that the drive to expel illegal foreigners would continue until all of them had gone back.