Pakistani authorities have launched a crackdown on Afghan refugees residing illegally in the country as fears have compounded that the exit of US-led forces in Afghanistan could ignite violence on the border, said a report published in The Washington Post.

In the wake of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, Pakistan and Iran received an influx of over seven million Afghan refugees. Several refugees, however, went back to their homeland after the Taliban were toppled from power by the US-backed Afghan forces in 2001.

Officials in Pakistan have expressed fears that the withdrawal of US forces in Afghanistan and shrinking US aid would propel natives to escape to Pakistan again.

“I believe this influx is already here,” said Mohammed Abbas Khan, a commissioner at Pakistan’s Office of Chief Commissioner for Afghan Refugees. “We are in a very tight situation ourselves, so having this influx is not desirable to anyone in the world.”

Although there are no definitive statistics on the number of new Afghan refugees, officials say that they have been receiving calls from local authorities about the springing up of new illegal settlements.

In order to discourage the racket of illegal immigrants, local officials in Peshawar are employing policies that would make it harder for Afghans to rent apartments or set up new camps.

Meanwhile, in the port city of Karachi, police squads are actively combing the metropolis for Afghan immigrants.

Federal officials are also in the midst of implementing new screening procedures along Pakistan’s 1500-mile border with Afghanistan.

This crackdown on immigrants and settlements comes at a time when Iran is also exerting immense pressure on the 800,000 Afghan refugees there to leave, according to Human Rights Groups.

Although there are 1.6 million legally registered Afghan refugees in Pakistan, officials strongly believe that 1 to 3 million reside in the country illegally.

National Security and Foreign Affairs Adviser to Prime Minister Sartaj Aziz underscored that Pakistan wanted the refugees to go back to their own country, adding that the immigrants burdened the country’s weak economy.

He also said that their presence made it easier for radical groups, with ties to Afghanistan, to operate clandestinely in the country.

Following an intense national debate last year, the National Assembly had sanctioned 1.6 million legally registered Afghans to stay until the end of 2015.

However, authorities fear that the number would rise on the outbreak of violence in Afghanistan after the withdrawal of Nato troops there in the wake of the Afghan presidential election.

A greater concern for the Pakistani leadership is that the Afghan economy would plummet after Western troops return home which would prompt those seeking employment to consider moving to Pakistan.

According to refugee official Abbas Khan, even though 83,000 Afghan refugees returned to their native land in 2012, less than half relocated last year and only less than 2,000 repatriated this year.

He added that Pakistan would only willingly accept a new influx of refugees in the event of a “humanitarian catastrophe”.

Under normal circumstances, he said, Afghan immigrants should expect to be subjected to new biometric border-control technologies such as iris and fingerprint scanners.

During a news conference in February, Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah said over 1 million Afghan refugees were residing in the country’s most populated city Karachi.

Subsequently, he constituted a special police unit to regulate the influx of Afghan immigrants. He furthermore directed police to set up checkpoints in order to prevent immigrants from settling in the city’s neighbourhoods.

Even in Peshawar, residents are becoming less tolerant of Afghan immigrants. Earlier in March, the KP Assembly passed a law entailing people renting apartments to acquire recommendations from two Pakistanis.

Conversely, Afghans say that few people are willing to endorse them.

According to Peshawar’s police chief Ijah Khan, the law was necessitated due to the growing threats of terrorism and crime. He claimed that 70 per cent of serious crimes, such as kidnapping and extortion, were committed by people of Afghan origin.