Germany Faces Rising Pressure to Relocate Afghans Stranded in Pakistan

DID Press: Pressure on the German federal government has intensified sharply after more than 250 human rights and civil society organizations urged Berlin to relocate Afghan nationals stranded in Pakistan before the end of the year.

The groups — including Amnesty International, Save the Children, Human Rights Watch and several church-based organizations — stressed in an open letter that some 1,800 Afghans accepted under Germany’s resettlement scheme are at risk of being sent back to Afghanistan and must be transferred to Germany “in the coming weeks.”

These Afghans were admitted through a program approved by the previous German government, but after conservative Chancellor Friedrich Merz took office in May and suspended the scheme, they have been left in limbo in Pakistan. To date, only about 350 individuals have managed to enter Germany after winning legal challenges in German courts. According to the organizations’ letter, most of those still awaiting relocation are women and children, including individuals with past work experience alongside German forces in Afghanistan or with backgrounds in media and human-rights advocacy.

The signatories, noting the approach of the Christmas season, called on the German government to uphold its commitments, writing: “Bring to safety as quickly as possible those to whom we have pledged protection.”

The German government, however, said it has secured assurances from Islamabad that Afghans eligible under the program will not be deported from Pakistan before year’s end — though the deadline is not extendable, leaving time pressure intact.

Meanwhile, new data from the UNHCR shows more than 2.18 million Afghans reside in Pakistan. Of these, 1.22 million are registered, with only 35 percent living in refugee villages. In addition, 1.09 million hold PoR cards, and 115,390 of the 115,652 asylum-seekers recorded in Pakistan are Afghan nationals.