The Afghan embassy in Islamabad has said that Pakistani police had launched a series of detaining Afghan refugees in the country.
The Afghan mission urged Pakistan to stop arresting Afghan refugees, after 250 were detained by counterterrorism officials and other agencies for not having legal travel documents, ABC News reported.
The embassy in Islamabad said that refugees continue to be apprehended in the capital, the garrison city of Rawalpindi, and surrounding areas.
In a series of tweets, the embassy said a delegation was working with Pakistani officials toward clarifying the legal statues of the detained Afghans and expediting their release.
It wrote that during the discussions with Pakistani officials, it was revealed that the Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) of Pakistan so far arrested 250 Afghans while some of them already had Proof of Registration Card (POR) and Afghan Citizen Cards (ACC).
“The government of Pakistan is urged to cease the arrest of Afghan refugees & officially address its concerns, as it can adversely impact bilateral relations btw the two nations,” it said in a tweet.
The embassy also confirmed that a female athlete, Arzoo Ahmadi, was briefly detained in southern Sindh province, the ABC report said, adding she was in Pakistan taking part in a martial arts event and was arrested by police on Tuesday morning for not having travel documents. It was reported that she was taken to a women’s shelter and later released.
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