Enough Is Enough, Pakistanis Say, as Welcome Mat Wears Thin for Afghan Refugees : Civil war: Citizens blame them for everything from rising rents to traffic, gunrunning to drug smuggling.

The welcome mat wears thin for Afghan refugees from the long civil war just beyond the border, and calls for them to leave grow louder.

“The Prophet Mohammed says you should not be a guest more than three days,” said Jamil Rehman, a fruit vendor who claimed that Afghans had cut in on his business. “We’ve given them 13 years; enough is enough.”

Rehman’s feelings are echoed throughout the dusty bazaars of Peshawar, a sleepy border town that became the staging area for Muslim rebels after a Marxist coup in Afghanistan in April, 1978.

A trickle of refugees became a torrent when Soviet troops entered the conflict in December, 1979.

Afghans fled in trucks, on foot, in horse-drawn carts. Pakistan welcomed them, declaring that Islam requires the faithful to provide food and shelter for the needy.

Few complaints arose while the struggle in Afghanistan was seen as a proxy war between the superpowers. When the Soviet army left early in 1989, however, the billions of dollars of international aid from the United States and other supporters of the rebels rapidly dried up.

More than 3.5 million Afghans, the world’s largest refugee population, remain in Pakistan, but “the days of the open door and the big welcome are over,” as a U.N. worker expressed it.

“People just want them to go home, forcibly if necessary,” the U.N. representative said, on condition of anonymity. “There is a growing feeling that the refugees have been here long enough, that they’re becoming a burden.”

The government remains steadfast in its commitment to the refugees, but more and more private citizens grumble, blaming them for everything from rising rents to traffic jams, gunrunning to drug smuggling.

Ill will is fostered by the number of refugees, the length of their stay, the enormous strain they put on scarce resources and their talent as entrepreneurs.

It heightens the frustration people feel with the government, which allowed Pakistan to become the primary channel for secret aid and weapons for the moujahedeen , or holy warriors, as the Muslim rebels are known.

Washington and Moscow have agreed not to send their clients weapons after Jan. 1, but unless the factions reach a settlement, that is unlikely to bring peace or persuade refugees that it is safe to go home.

Tens of thousands of Afghan villages have been bombed into oblivion. Irrigation systems, bridges and orchards have been destroyed, and millions of mines litter the countryside.

U.N. officials had predicted that 300,000 refugees would return home last spring, but new fighting across much of Afghanistan dashed those hopes.

Privately, many government officials blame the work of the United Nations and more than 100 relief agencies for keeping the refugees in Pakistan. If aid ceased, they argue, the refugees would leave.

Generally, Afghans believe the “holy war” against the communists ended with Soviet withdrawal and long to go home. They also claim proudly that rebel perseverance destroyed the Soviet army’s image of invincibility and precipitated the political changes in eastern Europe and the Soviet Union.

Those changes have deflected attention from Afghanistan and the plight of its refugees.

“The world is tired of Afghanistan,” said Benon Sevan, special representative of Javier Perez de Cuellar, the U.N. secretary-general.

“There are so many other issues, and the demand for money is greater. The Afghan refugees have to compete and there is less and less money coming in.”