Pakistan has deported more than 19,500 Afghans this month, among more than 80,000 who have left ahead of a 30 April deadline, according to the UN.

Pakistan has accelerated its drive to expel undocumented Afghans and those who had temporary permission to stay, saying it can no longer cope.

Between 700 and 800 families are being deported daily, Taliban officials say, with up to two million people expected to follow in the coming months.

Pakistani Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar flew to Kabul on Saturday for talks with Taliban officials. His counterpart Amir Khan Muttaqi expressed “deep concern” about deportations.

Some expelled Afghans at the border said they had been born in Pakistan after their families fled conflict.

More than 3.5 million Afghans have been living in Pakistan, according to the UN’s refugee agency, including around 700,000 people who came after the Taliban takeover in 2021. The UN estimates that half are undocumented.

Pakistan has taken in Afghans through decades of war, but the government says the high number of refugees now poses risks to national security and causes pressure on public services.

There has been a recent spike in border clashes between the security forces of both sides. Pakistan blames them on militants based in Afghanistan, which the Taliban deny.

Pakistan’s foreign ministry said the two sides had “discussed all issues of mutual interest” in Saturday’s meeting in Kabul.

Pakistan had extended a deadline for undocumented Afghans to leave the country by a month, to 30 April.

On the Torkham border crossing, some expelled Afghans told the BBC they left Afghanistan decades ago – or had never lived there.

“I lived my whole life in Pakistan,” said Sayed Rahman, a second-generation refugee born and raised in Pakistan. “I got married there. What am I supposed to do now?”

Saleh, a father of three daughters, worried what life under Taliban rule will mean for them. His daughters attended school in Pakistan’s Punjab province, but in Afghanistan, girls over the age of 12 are barred from doing so.

“I want my children to study. I don’t want their years in school to go to waste,” he said. “Everyone has the right to an education.”

Another man told the BBC: “Our children have never seen Afghanistan and even I don’t know what it looks like anymore. It might take us a year or more to settle in and find work. We feel helpless.”

At the border, men and women pass through separate gates, under the watch of armed Pakistani and Afghan guards. Some of those returning were elderly – one man was carried across on a stretcher, another in a bed.

Military trucks shuttled families from the border to temporary shelters. Those originally from distant provinces stay there for several days, waiting for transport to their home regions.

Families clustered under canvases to escape the 30C degree heat, as swirling dust caught in the eyes and mouth. Resources are stretched and fierce arguments often break out over access to shelter.

Returnees receive between 4,000 and 10,000 Afghanis (£41 to £104) from the Kabul authorities, according to Hedayatullah Yad Shinwari, a member of the camp’s Taliban-appointed finance committee.

The mass deportation is placing significant pressure on Afghanistan’s fragile infrastructure, with an economy in crisis and a population nearing 45 million people.

“We have resolved most issues, but the arrival of people in such large numbers naturally brings difficulties,” said Bakht Jamal Gohar, the Taliban’s head of refugee affairs at the crossing. “These people left decades ago and left all their belongings behind. Some of their homes were destroyed during 20 years of war.”

Nearly every family told the BBC that Pakistani border guards restricted what they could bring – a complaint echoed by some human rights groups.

Chaudhry said in response that Pakistan did “not have any policy that prevents Afghan refugees from taking their household items with them”.

One man, sitting on the roadside in the blistering sun, said his children had begged to stay in Pakistan, the country where they were born. They had been given temporary residency, but that expired in March.

“Now we’ll never go back. Not after how we were treated,” he said.

(BBC News)

America’s oldest serving astronaut Dan Pettit has returned to Earth on his 70th birthday.

The Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft carrying Pettit and his Russian crewmates Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner made a parachute-assisted landing in Kazakhstan’s steppe at 06:20 local time (01:20 GMT) on Sunday.

They spent 220 days on board the International Space Station (ISS), orbiting the Earth 3,520 times, the US space agency Nasa said.

For Pettit – who has now spent a total of 590 days in space – it was his fourth mission.

Still, he is not the oldest person to fly in orbit – that record belongs to John Glenn, who aged 77 flew on a Nasa mission in 1998. He died in 2016.

Pettit and the two Russian cosmonauts will now spend some time readjusting to gravity.

After that, Pettit – who was born in Oregon on 20 April 1955 – will be flown to Houston in Texas, while Ovchinin and Vagner will go to Russia’s main space training base in Zvyozdniy Gorodok (Star City) near Moscow.

Before their departure from the ISS, the crew handed command of the spaceship to Japanese astronaut Takuya Onishi.

Last month, two Nasa astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, finally returned to Earth after spending more than nine months on board the ISS – instead of the initially planned just eight days.

They flew to the ISS in June 2024 – but technical issues with the spacecraft they used to get to the space station meant they were only able to return to Earth on 18 March this year.

(BBC News)

Russian President Vladimir Putin says he has ordered his forces to “stop all military activity” in Ukraine, as he declared an “Easter truce” until the end of Sunday.

He said the 30-hour truce would last until 22:00 BST on Sunday (00:00 Moscow time), adding that Russian forces should be prepared to respond to “any possible violations”.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Kyiv would adhere to the truce, but accused Moscow of breaking it.

“If Russia is now suddenly ready to truly engage in a format of full and unconditional silence, Ukraine will act accordingly – mirroring Russia’s actions,” he said.

“Our actions are and will be symmetrical. The proposal for a full and unconditional 30-day silence remains on the table — the answer to it must come from Moscow,” he wrote on X.

He said fighting continued in Russia’s Kursk and Belgorod regions and Russian drones were still in use, but added that some areas had become quieter.

Zelensky said Ukraine would be ready to extend a truce beyond 20 April, seemingly referring to an earlier proposal from the US for a 30-day ceasefire which Ukraine had already agreed to.

Responding to Putin’s initial announcement, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiha wrote on X: “Putin has now made statements about his alleged readiness for a cease-fire. 30 hours instead of 30 days.”

“Unfortunately, we have had a long history of his statements not matching his actions. We know his words cannot be trusted and we will look at actions, not words,” he added.

Putin announced the temporary truce at a meeting with his chief of general staff, Valery Gerasimov.

“Based on humanitarian considerations… the Russian side announces an Easter truce. I order a stop to all military activities for this period,” Putin told Gerasimov.

“We assume that Ukraine will follow our example. At the same time, our troops should be prepared to repel possible violations of the truce and provocations by the enemy, any aggressive actions.”

The Russian defence ministry said its troops would adhere to the ceasefire provided it was “mutually respected” by Ukraine.

It is not the first time a pause in fighting has been suddenly announced – a previous attempt at a ceasefire during Orthodox Christmas in January 2023 fell apart after both sides failed to agree on a proposal.

Reacting to Putin’s truce announcement, a Foreign Office spokesman in the UK said: “Now is the moment for Putin to truly show he is serious about peace by ending his horrible invasion and committing to a full ceasefire, as the Ukrainian government has called for – not just a one day pause for Easter.”

Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. It is estimated that hundreds of thousands of people – the vast majority of them soldiers – have been killed or injured on all sides.

The US has been directly talking to Russia as part of its efforts to end the war, but has struggled to make major progress.

Last month, Moscow rejected a proposal for a full and unconditional ceasefire that had been agreed by the US and Ukraine.

US President Donald Trump on Friday warned Washington would “take a pass” on brokering further talks on ending the war in Ukraine unless there was quick progress.

He was speaking after Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the US was not “going to continue with this endeavour for weeks and months on end”, as it had “other priorities to focus on”.

“We need to determine very quickly now – and I’m talking about a matter of days – whether or not this is doable,” he added.

“If it’s not going to happen, then we’re just going to move on.”

(BBC News)