KOHAT, Feb 15: The issuance of three-year resident cards to Afghan displaced persons has been suspended on intervention of the UNHCR after the number of card holders exceeded the actual figure of refugees in Kohat.

The registration was suspended on Thursday last following doubts expressed by UNHCR representatives that after repatriation of Afghan refugees during the last five years, the number of the refugees was still the same, said Ibrahim Khattak, administrator of the Commissionerate of Afghan Refugees.

“The UNHCR has repatriated thousands of refugees after the Afghan presidential polls and before but those who have managed to come back somehow are also being issued identity cards for three years. It surely means that the whole exercise of registration and the repatriation has become doubtful and futile.”

He said there were various reasons creating problems in the registration process, like the enormous birth rate among Afghan families. According to their estimates, he said, each family had increased by three persons since the last census. Another reason is the coming back of repatriated refugees.

Similarly, most of Afghan labourers are not present in their camps at the time of census and a vast majority of them do not register, fearing forced repatriation.“The registration process will remain suspended until a report is submitted about the issue to make sure the process is carried out in a transparent manner and anomalies are removed,” he added.

It is learnt that in a majority of cases, names of some family members are missing in the census list on the basis of which the cards are issued.

Gul Agha, whose father has been refused identity card, said: “We gave names of the whole family to the census staff. Our family had cast five votes during the Afghanistan presidential elections but nobody had questioned them. But now the record has been tampered with. Those who can pay money to ‘Maliks’ are being registered and the poor are being ignored.”

A survey revealed that Afghan Maliks, in connivance with the Nadra staff, had been registering those refugees whose names were not in voter or census list on payment of Rs1000 per person.

The last date for issuing identity cards to refugees had been extended twice and the process was to be completed by February 15.