Pakistan court stops expulsion of Afghan medical students

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A Pakistan court blocked on Friday an order by the country’s medical board for dozens of Afghans studying to be doctors to be expelled from colleges and universities and sent home.

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“The Lahore High Court has extended the stay order preventing the expulsion of over a hundred Afghan medical students from medical colleges until the next hearing,” a Lahore court decision seen by AFP said.

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The judge, Justice Khalid Ishaq, did not fix a date for the next hearing.

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Earlier this month, the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) said in a letter to academic institutes that no “form of facilitation of Afghan nationals is permitted for the current academic session”.

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The PMDC letter to college deans said: “Afghans previously enrolled in medical or dental programs in Pakistan are required to return to Afghanistan.”

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The letter, a copy of which was seen by AFP, did not say on whose authority the medical council was acting, but said: “The matter is of highest priority and relates to national policy directions.”

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Speaking after Friday’s hearing, final-year Lahore student Mubin Ulfati told AFP: “We were predicting this, because in a view of human rights, education is our primary right, so we were 100 percent sure that this was going to happen.”

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The 24-year-old, who had just returned from a hospital shift in July when he was given 24 hours to leave the country, added: “Everything is still in a desperate situation, and we don’t know what to do.”

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A similar court petition has already been rejected by officials in Balochistan province, while another is under way in Sindh.

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Relations between neighbours Pakistan and Afghanistan have plummeted since the Taliban government’s return to power in Kabul in 2021, and escalated into weeks of war earlier this year.

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More than 2.5 million Afghans — many who spent decades living as refugees in Pakistan — have been expelled or left voluntarily over the past three years, according to UN data, as part of a deportation drive by Islamabad.

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Human Rights Watch urged authorities to reverse the PMDC order, highlighting the plight of women who are banned from studying in Afghanistan.

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Amnesty International slammed the move as “discriminatory and arbitrary”.

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Among the Lahore petitioners was a 23-year-old who was just days away from finishing her second-year studies when she was told she must “go back and leave everything”.

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A judge suspended the expulsion order at the provincial level on September 11, but the student said her records have already been expunged from the university’s online platform.

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– ‘Never give up’ –

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The undergraduate, who requested anonymity for security reasons, was forced to end her medical studies in Afghanistan after Taliban authorities banned women from universities.

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She said she was one of about 20 Afghan women out of 30,000 applicants to win a scholarship in Pakistan.

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“I will never give up… I learned from this journey that sadness doesn’t bring anything,” she told an AFP journalist in Kabul by phone.

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Asad Jamal, one of several lawyers representing the students in Lahore, criticised the PMDC orders which he said failed to provide medics with “any opportunity to be heard”.

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The PMDC did not respond to AFP’s request for comment.

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Jamal said even if the students lose their Lahore petition, the case could still be taken to Pakistan’s Federal Constitutional Court.

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Some Afghan medics had been deported even before the PMDC order, such as a fourth-year student who tried unsuccessfully for more than a year to renew his visa.

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“We are only students. We are not political people,” said the medic, who was specialising in ophthalmology and requested anonymity.

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The 33-year-old was pulled out of the operating theatre and expelled within two days.

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“Please, let us finish our studies,” he said. “We will finish, and we will go back to our country.”

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AFP

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