Jalozai 2.69

Jalozai refugee camp, 35 kilometres southeast of Peshawar, Pakistan, was one of the largest of 150 refugee or transit camps in Pakistan, holding Afghan refugees from the 1980s Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. It had an estimated 70,000 refugees at its peak. New Jalozai adjoined the original Jalozai camp in November 2000, taking in a new wave of arriving Afghan refugees. The camps briefly received an additional influx of refugees in the period after 9/11, leading up to the United States invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001. After the fall of the Taliban, the vast majority of refugees in the Jalozai camp returned home or were relocated elsewhere. In February 2002, with a remaining population of 800, Jalozai camp was formally closed. But some problem elements remained through at least 2003, necessitating Pakistani military raids on the former camp that year. By 2012 Pakistan banned extensions to all foreign visas and continued its effort to close the remaining refugee camps.1979 Soviet invasionAfter 1979, Peshawar served as a political centre for anti-Soviet Mujahideen, and became surrounded by huge camps of Afghan refugees. Many of the Afghan refugees fled through the historic Khyber Pass, near Peshawar. That major border city of a million people then replaced Kabul and Kandahar as the centre of ethnic Pashtuns (Pakhtuns) cultural development during the 1980s.