In modern history, Pakistan became one of the earliest laboratories for global refugee externalisation, serving as a major destination for the West to “hide away” the human cost of its armed interventions — the millions of people displaced by war.

While the United States and Soviet Union fought over territories thousands of miles from their own capitals during the Cold War, Pakistan, which has never had any constitutional refugee framework nor held the administrative capacity to manage its own population, hosted millions of Afghans fleeing destruction.

Who gained the most from the millions who entered Pakistan? As interests in Islamabad and Washington aligned, both the Pakistani state and its non-governmental organisations (NGOs) — which mushroomed overnight — benefitted tremendously from the unchecked aid that flowed to the country.

This is the global refugee market: a political economy in which wealthy states transfer the costs of refugee protection to poorer countries through aid, trade concessions, security partnerships and diplomatic favours. Refugee hosting has now become a global export industry.

From Pakistan during the Cold War to present-day Rwanda and Türkiye, refugee hosting has evolved into a global political economy driven by foreign aid and strategic interests

From Pakistan during the Cold War to present-day Rwanda and Türkiye, refugee hosting has evolved into a global political economy driven by foreign aid and strategic interests

THE COLD WAR PROTOTYPE

Pakistan’s historically aid-dependent economy was so strong in the 1980s that, within three weeks of the Soviet Union entering Afghanistan, President Gen Ziaul Haq refused $400 million (today $1.2 billion) in January 1980 from the US, calling it “peanuts”. Gen Zia would then go on to receive billions of dollars, both in military assistance and those meant to go to those affected by war.

This aid inflow did two things. The first was bringing in cash to prop up Pakistan’s economy, and the second was that, in order to keep aid flowing, Pakistan had strong incentives to maintain an open refugee policy.

At its peak in 1999,........

© Dawn (Magazines)