UNHCR declares Pakistan largest host of refugees

GENEVA: The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) has declared Pakistan as the largest host of refugees in the world.

According to the UNHCR report, Pakistan hosts the largest number of refugees in the world and nearly all the 1.45 million refugees in the country belong to Afghanistan.

Pakistan has generously hosted the world’s largest refugee population for almost three decades, and it was essential that more support be mobilized from the international community, the report added.

The report further stated, that at the same time, voluntary repatriation of Afghan refugees from Pakistan to their home country had also been the largest in the world.

Since March 2002, UNHCR has facilitated the return of approximately 4.1 million registered Afghans from Pakistan, it added.