Governments Alarmed as 50-100k Pakistani Workers Flee To Live in Iraq
Iraq has accused Grand Ayatollah Bashir al-Najafi of working with travel agencies to bring Pakistanis to work illegally in Iraq under the guise of a religious pilgrimage
The Pakistani government has lost track of around 50,000 citizens who traveled to Iraq for religious pilgrimages over the past several years, the Iraqi and Pakistani governments announced last week. In response to the news of the missing individuals, who are thought to be living and working illegally in Iraq, Pakistan is implementing a new monitoring system for individuals traveling to Iran, Iraq, and Syria.
The missing travelers are thought to be Shiites who had obtained visas to visit the central Iraqi city of Karbala for Ashura, a holy day in the Muslim calendar.
After Pakistani Minister of Religious Affairs Chaudhry Salik Hussain raised the issue, Iraqi Minister of Labor Ahmed Al Asadi announced an investigation into the matter, an official statement from the Iraqi News Agency said. The Iraqi Ministry of Labor expressed disapproval regarding the large number of Pakistani laborers working illegally in the country.
A large number of foreigners from Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, and the Philippines work illegally in Iraq, mostly earning between $15 and $25 a day. According to the Iraqi Ministry of Labor, only 71,000 of the 1 million foreign workers in Iraq are registered with official documents.
Abdul Amir Taqi, a director at the Iraqi Ministry of Labor, told The Media Line that more than 100,000 of Iraq’s foreigners are from Pakistan. Pakistanis in Iraq work mostly in crafts, construction, delivery, food service, and other simple fields, he said.
“We are facing a big problem with these people. They visit Iraq for religious visits, and then they leak into the labor market, work illegally and without obtaining permits, and for wages lower than those of Iraqis, and this will cause an imbalance in the labor market in Iraq,” Taqi said.
He explained that the figure of 50,000 Pakistanis does not refer only to those who traveled to Iraq this year. Of the 88,427 Pakistanis who entered Iraq for Ashura in 2024, 84,251 have left, meaning that only 4,176 are still in Pakistan, he said.
Ashura, which took place this year on July 16, is part of an important tourist season for Iraq. Among Shiites, the day marks the seventh-century killing of Imam Husayn ibn Ali.
Shiites from around the world visit Iraq during the Ashura season. In 2022, 6 million Shiites from abroad visited Iraq for the pilgrimage.
According to Mahdi Al-Haidari, the owner of a company that transports Shiite tourists to Iraq’s holy shrines, Pakistani visitors pay between $800 and $1,200 for a 10-day pilgrimage.
He explained that his company holds on to the visitors’ passports, both so that they don’t lose their passports and to ensure that the visitors leave Iraq at the end of the trip.
This year, he told The Media Line, “some of these pilgrims did not return, and we did not find them in the hotel or in their place of residence. We do not know where they went, and we informed the Iraqi authorities about that.”
Syed Tayyab Kazmi, a Rawalpindi, Pakistan-based tour consultant, said that lenient Iraqi immigration laws and high Pakistani unemployment have led many Pakistanis to seek work in Iraq. Unlike in other Gulf states, individuals who have been deported from Iraq are allowed to return to the country.
Both Shia and Sunni unemployed individuals obtain cheap pilgrim visas to enter Iraq and start working. There is a lot of construction work, with foreign companies paying salaries in dollars. These unemployed individuals work for two or three years and then return home after paying the normal fine.
“Both Shia and Sunni unemployed individuals obtain cheap pilgrim visas to enter Iraq and start working,” he told The Media Line. “There is a lot of construction work, with foreign companies paying salaries in dollars. These unemployed individuals work for two or three years and then return home after paying the normal fine.”
Since the report of the 50,000 missing Pakistanis, Iraq has announced the arrest of several Pakistani citizens. A number of Pakistanis were arrested more than 300 miles from Karbala in Erbil Governorate, the capital of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. Others were arrested in the capital Baghdad, more than 50 miles from Karbala.
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Shamil Al-Ghariri, a brigadier general in the Iraqi police, told The Media Line that Iraq plans to tighten security measures for visitors from Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, and other Asian countries.
“Iraq grants entry visas for visits only, but the issue of work has other controls, but due to the large number of visitors in Karbala, it is not possible to control all these numbers, and Pakistanis have infiltrated through the desert and unofficial routes to other regions and governorates for work,” he said.
Al-Ghariri said that Pakistanis who come for economic reasons may end up joining terrorist organizations.
“The mere presence of someone illegally in the country poses a threat, and all possibilities are possible,” he said.
Some young Pakistani Shiite pilgrims have joined the Zainebiyoun Brigade, a group designated by Pakistan as a terrorist organization since April of this year. The brigade mainly operates in Syria in support of President Bashar al-Assad.
The group’s activities have drawn scrutiny from international observers, who have raised alarms about its potential to fuel sectarian tensions and instability in the region.
In statements to the media, Pakistani Minister of Religious Affairs Hussain said that the migrants were in search of “work and money” and would not join any terrorist group.
Iraqi politicians have accused Grand Ayatollah Bashir al-Najafi of organizing the pilgrims’ illegal stay. Al-Najafi is a cleric of Pakistani origin living in the Iraqi province of Najaf, one of the holy places for Shiite Muslims.
This cleric promised Pakistanis to obtain Iraqi citizenship in exchange for $10,000 from each person,” Shahab al-Khalidi, a prominent Iraqi politician, told The Media Line. “These accusations are documented, and we have evidence for them.
“This cleric promised Pakistanis to obtain Iraqi citizenship in exchange for $10,000 from each person,” Shahab al-Khalidi, a prominent Iraqi politician, told The Media Line. “These accusations are documented, and we have evidence for them.”
Al-Khalidi also accused al-Najafi of coordinating with tourism companies to offer Pakistanis work in Iraq in exchange for $2,000.
“This matter was done in coordination with a number of Iraqi political figures and corrupt officers,” he said. “It is not new, and everyone knows about it, but no one is taking any legal steps against Bashir al-Najafi because he is a Shiite cleric and cannot be touched.”
He expressed concern that some of the Pakistanis staying illegally in Iraq would form a militia or join the Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces.
Osama Al-Shuaibi, an Iraqi journalist specializing in international affairs, also expressed concern that the migrants might join an armed group.
“So far, it seems that the Pakistanis have come only for work, but it is not unlikely that they will be recruited later to fight, whether in the Popular Mobilization Forces or other Shiite militias, since they are Shiite Muslims,” he told The Media Line. He said that they might also be recruited to fight in Syria or Lebanon.
Iran exploits everything to its advantage, but so far, what has happened is chaos, and the Iraqis will pay the price, whether they lose their jobs in the labor market or even suffer from the terrorism of these people.
“Iran exploits everything to its advantage, but so far, what has happened is chaos, and the Iraqis will pay the price, whether they lose their jobs in the labor market or even suffer from the terrorism of these people,” Al-Shuaibi said.
Eyewitnesses confirmed to The Media Line that Pakistanis are living in illegal houses built on some state-owned lands on the outskirts of Najaf.
Ahmed Al-Hadi, an Iraqi citizen from Najaf, told The Media Line that police and army vehicles refuse to enter the neighborhood where al-Najafi and other Pakistanis live. He also described other illegally built houses on al-Najafi’s farms.
“I witnessed the arrival of a group of Pakistanis there,” he said. “They arrived in trucks, got out of them, and immediately started working on building their houses. Within hours, these houses were ready, as they are random houses and can be seen from afar.”
“We see them working on the farms of the cleric Bashir al-Najafi, and no one knows what they are doing, but what we know is that they are the ones the Iraqi government is looking for, but no police car can enter, as some of them have been assigned to carry weapons and stand on the borders of these areas and farms, and they form a guard for them,” he continued.
Ali Mahdi, an Iraqi politician, said that Pakistanis are being brought to Najaf in an attempt to change the province’s demographics.
They bring Shiites from outside Iraq and attribute them to Iraq through forging IDs and passports, and then they are counted as Iraqis. The original people of Najaf are being displaced to other areas, and these people are coming in their place. The Iraqi government must take immediate measures to get them out of Iraq.
“They bring Shiites from outside Iraq and attribute them to Iraq through forging IDs and passports, and then they are counted as Iraqis,” he said. “The original people of Najaf are being displaced to other areas, and these people are coming in their place. The Iraqi government must take immediate measures to get them out of Iraq.”
Al-Najafi’s office responded to The Media Line’s inquiry into the matter with a short message reading, “Ayatollah Bashir al-Najafi has no knowledge of what is happening. He is only busy with religious matters.”
Pakistani Religious Affairs Secretary Zulfiquar Haider told the Pakistani press that the country would establish a directorate for religious visitors to Iraq and Iran, similar to the directorate that organizes pilgrims’ travel to Mecca.
Pakistani Senator Raja Nasir Abbas, a member of the Senate Standing Committee on Religious Affairs, told The Media Line that the government is working on a biometric monitoring system for such pilgrims.
In a briefing to the committee, Religious Affairs Minister Hussain said that “the government has developed a policy to streamline such visits.”
Hussain and Federal Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi met with Iraqi Ambassador Hamid Abbas Lafta to address the situation. Lafta said that some travel agents were charging $80-$90 for a visa to enter Iraq, even though visas are free for Pakistani pilgrims.
Lafta provided Pakistan a list of such travel agents, whom Naqvi pledged to blacklist.
The federal interior minister assured the Iraqi ambassador of full cooperation in resolving the issue of illegal Pakistani residents in Iraq.
