LANDI KOTAL: More than 300 unregistered Afghan families were evicted from their houses near the Torkham border after the expiry of the deadline given to them by the local administration on Monday.

Local sources said that Khasadar Force used heavy machinery to demolish at least 29 mud houses during a ‘cleanup operation’ in Bacha Maina locality where majority of the illegal Afghan families were residing.

Earlier, all pleadings by the affected families for an extension in the deadline were ignored by the local authorities as officials insisted that they received clear orders from their high-ups to expel immediately all unregistered Afghan families and demolish their houses.

Officials said that notices were issued to those families after credible intelligence reports about mobile phone calls made from Afghan SIMs in most of the extortion and kidnapping cases in different parts of the country from the said locality.

They said that the operation would continue till all those illegal structures were razed to the ground. They said that a total of 318 Afghan families comprising 826 individuals were residing in a compound of over 50 mud houses in Bacha Maina.

Sources said that heavy machinery was used for demolition of the houses but majority of the expelled families shifted to Landi Kotal instead of being deported to Afghanistan.

They said that some of the residents of the area were allowed to stay back after they showed their Computerised National Identity Cards to the local authorities. Officials said that the entire operation went on smoothly as they faced no resistance and most of the families had already packed their belongings before launch of the operation.

Published in Dawn, April 12th, 2016