US plans to deport 150 Afghans to Afghanistan through Pakistan

The Trump administration is preparing to send more than 150 Afghan nationals held in US jails and detention centres back to Afghanistan through Pakistan, according to a New York Times report cited by Aaj News.

The report, which quoted three unnamed US officials, said the first chartered flight could leave on 2 November. Detainees would be handed to Pakistani authorities and then to Afghan officials across the border, it said.

Pakistan has not confirmed the arrangement or issued any official response.

Those facing removal include relatives of allies of the former Afghan government and people from minority groups, according to the report. Because Washington has no formal diplomatic relations with the Taliban government, Pakistan is being used as an intermediary route, the report said.

Under US law, a person cannot be deported directly to a country where their life or freedom would be threatened. The report said Immigration and Customs Enforcement had told the detainees that Afghanistan is nonetheless their final destination.

Detainees have been moved in recent days from facilities around the country to a detention centre in Louisiana, where charter flights are planned in the first week of November, the report said.

One of those held is a 47-year-old Afghan refugee who arrived in the United States in 1981, aged two, with his family after the Soviet invasion. His permanent residence documents were revoked after convictions in two cases of robbery and threats in 2003, though he continued to report to immigration authorities as required. He married a US citizen in 2020 after coming out as gay, and says Taliban policies would put his life at serious risk in Afghanistan.

Another Afghan, whose wife served in the former Afghan army and the women's police force, told a court he was targeted in Taliban violence in 2023 and reached the US in 2024. A US court rejected his asylum claim.

Pakistan says it has returned more than 2.7 million Afghan nationals, documented and undocumented, since 2023, citing security concerns. The government says the Taliban shelter militants who carry out attacks inside Pakistan, and that it intends to remove more Afghan nationals.

Previous US administrations deported Afghans through third countries only on a very limited scale, mostly people convicted of serious crimes. Research data from the University of California, Berkeley and UCLA cited in the report shows only 97 Afghans were sent back over the past four years.

The November operation is part of the Trump administration's wider mass deportation drive, which has also tightened visa restrictions on Afghans who worked with the US military. Some were moved to African countries, and some were pressed into voluntary return from a US military base in Qatar.