TEHRAN, April 30: Iran has expelled tens of thousands of Afghan refugees within the space of a few days in a new drive aimed at returning one million of them home by March next year, media said on Monday.

The expulsions are a sign that Iran is prepared to wait no longer in executing its stated aim of returning two million Afghan refugees living in Iran, despite protests from Kabul.

“More than 30,000 people have been collected and the majority of them sent back to their country via the borders,” since the drive began on April 21, Interior Minister Mostafa Pour Mohammadi was quoted as saying in the daily Tehran Emrouz.

“In the first phase of our plan, we hope to expel 500,000 people and when this is successful we shall fulfil the plan of repatriating one million resident aliens by the end of the year (March 2008),” the minister added.

The head of Iran's police force for foreigners said that 20,000 people had been expelled in the first three days of the drive alone.—AFP