Pashtun diaspora#Australia

Pashtun diaspora (Pashto: بهر مېشت پښتانه) comprises all ethnic Pashtuns. There are millions of Pashtuns who are living outside of their traditional homeland of Pashtunistan, a historic region that is today situated over parts of Afghanistan and Pakistan.^[1] While the (erstwhile) Pashtunistan is home to the majority of Pashtun people, there are significant local Pashtun diaspora communities scattered across the neighbouring Pakistani provinces of Sindh and Punjab, particularly in their respective provincial capital cities of Karachi and Lahore. Outside of Afghanistan and Pakistan, significant Pashtun diaspora communities are found in Iran, the United States, the United Kingdom, Netherlands, Australia, Canada, Russia and the Gulf Arab states.

The Pashtun people, who are an Eastern Iranian ethnolinguistic group, are believed to have settled in the traditional Pashtunistan region around the early 1st millennium AD.^[2][3]

Country	Ethnic Pashtuns	Year
Iran	2,425,000	2022[4]
United States	279,628	2024[5]
United Kingdom	50,597	2021[6][7][8]
Germany	48,000	2023[9]
Tajikistan	32,400	2017[10]
Canada	31,700	2021[11]
Russia	19,800	2015[12]
Australia	8,979	2021[13]

The ethnonym Afghan (of Persian origin) has been historically used since the 3rd century AD to refer to the Pashtuns, and is now used to describe every citizen of Afghanistan. Pashtuns make up the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan, comprising 46–65%^[14][15] of the total Afghan population. Approximately 2 million Afghan refugees live in the neighboring Pakistan. The majority of them are Pashtuns who were born in that country.^[16]

The Pashtuns are scattered all over Afghanistan, they can be found in almost every province of the country.^[17] Kandahar is the second largest city in Afghanistan and a stronghold of the Pashtun culture. The city of Lashkargah in the south, Farah in the west, Jalalabad in the east, and Kunduz in the north are other prominent cultural centres whose populations are predominantly Pashtuns.

Most Pashtuns are based in Pakistan. Pashtuns are one of the largest ethnic minorities in Pakistan, making up to 15.4% of the total population of Pakistan.^[18][19][20] Pashtuns form the majority ethnic group in the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and northern Balochistan.

With as many as 7 million by some estimates, the city of Karachi in the Sindh province hosts the largest concentration of urban Pashtuns population in the world^[21][22] Some important Pashtun cities of Pakistan include Peshawar, Quetta, Zhob, Loralai, Killa Saifullah,Swat, Mardan, Charsada, Mingora, Bannu, Parachinar, and Swabi. The province of Baluchistan is although named after the Baloch, but Pashtuns are the majority there and the Baloch population is in fact less than Pashtuns in the Balochistan province.^{[citation needed]} However most of the land of Baluchistan is covered by Balochs and Brahuis while Pashtuns are concentrated only in the north of the province.

Pashtuns make up a minority of the total population of Hazara Division of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.^[23] Pashtuns are mostly found in Battagram and Torghar District. Pashtun tribes speak Pashto language while Jadoons, Tareens and Dilazaks of Abbottabad and Haripur District speak Hindko language and sometimes Pashto as their second language. Pashtuns also make up a minority of the Chitral district, which is mainly inhabited by Kho and Kalasha people who speak Khowar.

The following table outlines the Pashtun population in different provinces of Pakistan:

Province	Pashtuns
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
Sindh
Balochistan
Punjab
Azad Kashmir
Islamabad Capital Territory
Pakistan	39 million[a][18]

There were over 100,000 Pashtuns living in Iran in 1993. The Pashtuns there are mainly concentrated in the Afghan-Iran border, in the Khorasan Province of Iran.^[24] The settling of Pashtuns in Iran goes back to the 18th century during the Durrani reign. Timur Shah Durrani, an ethnic Pashtun, the son of Ahmad Shah Durrani and King of Afghanistan, was born in Mashhad, in the Khorasan province of Iran, which was part of the Durrani empire at that time.^[25]

Numerous Pashtun tribes have settled in Zabul since the Durrani dynasty.^[26][27] The Pashtun tribes in Zabol from other tribes such as Moradgholi, Kouchakzai, Ghaljaei, lakziyan, Galavi, Barakzai, Khajeali, and Sufi. Regardless of their origins, they are generally seen as Persian zaboli by the society in Iran. The Moradgholi tribe is descended from Amir Shahu Khan Barakzai a member of Barakzai dynasty. The founder of this tribe in Zabul is Murad Khan, the son of Amir Kalan Khan. After him, his son Moradgholi, who also takes the name of the tribe, became the leader. Members of Moradgholi clan also live in Mazandaran, Golestan and other parts of Iran. Kouchakzai is a sub-tribe of the moradgholi clan.^[27]

In the United States, the first documented presence of Pashtuns first occurred in the 1900s. Following the overthrow of King Zahir Shah of Afghanistan in the 1973 Afghan Republican Coup, the Crown Prince of Afghanistan, Ahmad Shah Khan settled in Virginia. Since the late 1970s and onwards, Pashtuns began immigrating to the United States of America in larger numbers following the Saur Revolution in Afghanistan in 1978. Pashtuns in the United States are famous for running top Afghan cuisine restaurants.^[28][29][30] The Pashtun diaspora in the United States is the largest Pashtun Diaspora in the west numbering at over 270,000.^[31] Zalmay Khalilzad, an ethnic Pashtun from the Noorzai tribe, served as United States ambassador to the United Nations, serving in the role from 2007 to 2009. Khalilzad was the highest ranking Muslim-American in the United States government at the time he left the position.^[32] He would later be appointed by Trump to serve as special representative for Afghanistan reconciliation in 2018 and helped broker the US–Taliban deal and facilitating the final United States withdrawal from Afghanistan.^[33][34][35] In April 2025, Trump appointed member of the Pashtun Barakzai Dynasty, Mary Kabir-Seraj Bischoping as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Afghanistan.^[36]

As of 2021 there are over 31,000 Pashtuns living in Canada^[37]

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The United Kingdom is home to some 50,000 Pashtuns.^[38][39][40] Pashtun diaspora in UK have made their presence felt through their restaurants with traditional names like Bab-e-Khyber, Hujra, and Kabuli pulao. It is one of the most vibrant Pashtun diaspora in the west.^[41]

In the latter part of the 19th century several thousand men from Afghanistan, Baluchistan, Kashmir, Sind, Rajasthan, Egypt, Persia, Turkey and Punjab, but collectively known as "Afghans", were recruited during the initial British development of the Australian Outback, especially for the operation of camel trains in desert areas.^[42] These consisted of men who were not allowed to bring their families with them, many married local Aborigines and are now known as Ghans.^[43] During the 1980s and 90s, Pashtuns began settling in Perth, Melbourne, Sydney and other major cities of Australia.

The 2011 Indian census found the number of Pashto speakers in the country numbered at 21,677.^[b][c][44]

Although their exact numbers are hard to determine, they are at least more than 100,000, for it is known that in 1954, over 100,000 nomadic Pakhtuns living in Kashmir Valley were granted Indian citizenship.^[45] They still follow their traditional justice system of Jirga.^[46] Those settled and living in the Kashmir Valley speak Pashto, and are found chiefly in the southwest of the valley, where Pashtun colonies have been built over time. The Pashtuns chiefly came in under the Durranis, but many were brought by Maharajah Gulab Singh for service on the frontier.^[47] Pashto is also spoken in two villages, Dhakki and Changnar (Chaknot), located on the Line of Control in Kupwara district.^[48]

A further small, scattered Pashtun population still exists in some major cities of India with large Muslim populations, with the majority of Pashto-speaking individuals residing in the states of Delhi and Uttar Pradesh India; who also have adopted local languages of the respective areas they live in, as their second language.^[49] These Pashtuns, numbering around 14,161,^[50][51] have retained the use of the Pashto language and are still able to speak and understand it. This is partially because until recently, most of these Pashtuns were able to travel to Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.^[52]

Hundreds of thousands of Pashtuns reside in the Middle East, particularly in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, and Oman.^[53] Many of them are involved in the transport business, while others are employees of construction companies.

About 300,000 Pashtuns migrated to the Gulf countries between 1976 and 1981, representing 35% of Pakistani immigrants.^[53]

In the latter part of the 19th century several thousand men from Afghanistan, Baluchistan, Kashmir, Sind, Rajasthan, Egypt, Persia, Turkey and Punjab, but collectively known as "Afghans", were recruited during the initial British development of the Australian Outback, especially for the operation of camel trains in desert areas.^[42] These consisted of men who were not allowed to bring their families with them, many married local Aborigines and are now known as Ghans.^[43] During the 1980s and 90s, Pashtuns began settling in Perth, Melbourne, Sydney and other major cities of Australia.

Since the early 1900s there have been many generations of Pashtuns who migrated from Afghanistan and the tribal areas of Pakistan (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa). Pashtun settlements in Thailand have been common throughout the provinces. There is even a Thai-Pashtun Friendship Association and they are fiercely independent, as a result they often are well treated and respected by the Thai locals. Countries like Indonesia, Singapore, Brunei and Malaysia, Myanmar also have similar cases of Pashtun settlements, which those who are of descent are quickly assimilated to the local Indian ethnic minority community while those recent migrants or settlers belong to the Pakistani diaspora, since most of the migrants came from Pakistan.

Some people living in Guyana and Suriname claim to be of Afghan descent.^[54]

• Pashtun culture
• Pashtun people
• Pashtun tribes
• Pashtunistan

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