he return of millions of Afghans from neighboring Pakistan and Iran is pushing Afghanistan to the brink, the U.N. refugee agency said on Friday, describing an unprecedented scale of returns. A total of 5.4 million people have returned to Afghanistan since October 2023, mostly from the two neighboring countries, UNHCR’s Afghanistan representative Arafat Jamal said, speaking to a U.N. briefing in Geneva via video link from Kabul, the Afghan capital. “This is massive, and the speed and scale of these returns has pushed Afghanistan nearly to the brink,” Jamal said.Pakistan launched a sweeping crackdown in Oct. 2023 to expel migrants without documents, urging those in the country to leave of their own accord to avoid arrest and forcible deportation and forcibly expelling others. Iran also began a crackdown on migrants at around the same time.

Full report : The return of millions of Afghans from Pakistan and Iran pushes Afghanistan to the brink, UN warns.