Islamabad: Pakistan has decided to extend the stay of Afghan refugees in the country till 2015, officials said.
The legal stay of nearly 1.6 million Afghan refugees expired June 30, and the federal cabinet decided to extend the period for another two and a half years, Xinhua reported.
"The cabinet considers the issue of repatriation of Afghan refugees beyond June 30 and decides that the Proof of the Registration Card (PoR) for them may be extended up till 2015," a government statement said.
The UN refugee agency says that besides 1.6 million registered Afghans, there are more that one million unregistered Afghan refugees living in Pakistan.
According to statistics from the Afghan ministry of refugee repatriation, over the last 10 years, nearly 3.8 million Afghan refugees voluntarily returned to their country from Pakistan.
IANS
