Pakistani forces are swooping on suspected Taleban supporters near the southwest border with Afghanistan and have arrested more than 500 Afghan âillegal immigrants,â officials said on Thursday. âWe have since last week detained more than 500 Afghans staying illegally in Baluchistan and they are being deported,â Shoaib Suddle, police chief of the southwest province of Baluchistan, told AFP. The first 150 will be deported later on Thursday at the border town of Chaman, 100 kilometers west of the provincial capital Quetta. âIt is for the Afghan authorities to find out who is a Taleban among them but we suspect there may be many such elements in the lot,â Suddle said.
| "And we're tired of having them around. We've got enough of our own loons." |
The mass arrests mark the first large-scale effort by Pakistan to expel illegal Afghans from Baluchistan, and follows months of accusations that Taleban commanders and fighters are living freely in the province and orchestrating a guerrilla campaign inside Afghanistan from Pakistani soil. |