By Matin Mehrab and Zahra Nader
Five months ago, Zohra managed to enter Iran with her husband, son, and brother-in-law, who had served in the Afghan army. Zohra says the Iranian government allowed them to enter without visas because of imminent threats by the Taliban to the lives of members of the security forces of the previous Afghan government.
“After arriving at the border, Iranian government welcomed us and took us from the border to the police station. They gave us biscuits to eat.” Solo men spent the night in detention rooms while women and children stayed in the washroom, which had no water and smelled very bad, she recounts in a phone interview with Zan Times.
Since then, Zohra and her family have lived in a six-square-metre room in Sang-e Safid camp, which has been used as detention centre for refugees and has been described by Human Rights Watch as a “veritable prison.” She says that refugees who had money to start new lives got a six-month permit to stay in Iran and left for Isfahan, Mashhad, and Tehran, but, lacking those funds, she and her family had no choice but to stay in the camp.
“We don’t get enough food and even this small amount is very low in nutrition. Most of the time, my husband and I don’t eat at all and we both give our food to our son so that he doesn’t go hungry,” she says.
“My heart aches for two pregnant friends. One of them stands behind the wall and cries every day, she craves good food but there is none,” Zohra describes, in sorrow. The other pregnant friend developed severe depression. For hours, she’ll cry in the bathroom.
Still, Zohra considers herself lucky that she was able to escape the Taliban. After they arrived, the border was closed, she adds. Now, many Afghans, including one of her friends who was a doctor at a military hospital, are waiting to join her at the Sang-e Safid camp.
In a report published on Wednesday, Amnesty International said that Afghan citizens, who were left behind in the chaotic Western withdrawal process have tried to escape from the Taliban by crossing into Iran and Turkey, but were repeatedly met with harsh treatment at those borders, including “unlawful” deportation and firing at them.
“One year after the end of airlift evacuations from Afghanistan, many of those left behind are risking their lives to leave the country – Afghans who have travelled to the Iranian and Turkish borders over the past year, in search of safety, have instead been forcibly returned under fire,” Marie Forestier, researcher on refugee and migrants rights at Amnesty International said in a statement.
“We documented how Iranian security forces have unlawfully killed and injured dozens of Afghans since last August, including by firing repeatedly into packed cars. Turkish border guards have also unlawfully used live ammunition against Afghans, firing into the air to repel people, and also shooting at them in some cases,” Forestier adds.
The report, titled “They do not treat us like humans,” has documented the murder of 11 refugees from Afghanistan on the border of Iran since August 2021, although it emphasizes that “the true death toll is likely to be significantly higher.” The report states that Afghans who manage to enter either of the two countries are “routinely arbitrarily detained, and subjected to torture and other ill-treatment before being unlawfully and forcibly returned.”
Amnesty International researchers prepared this report based on interviews with 74 Afghan citizens in Herat and the border town of Islam Qala. Forty-eight of them said that they came under fire while crossing the border.
Shaukat Ullah, 26, who was recently deported by Iranian border forces, confirms some of the findings in an interview with Zan Times. “When we were taken to Sang-e Safid camp, we were kept there for three weeks, and we had to pay 150,000 tomans [roughly US$3.50] per night for our accommodation, but we didn’t have enough food or a proper place to sleep. Those who protested were severely tortured. I never protested, despite the fact that the Iranian security forces kicked and punched me several times.”
Another Afghan, Firoz, endured many difficulties entering Iran illegally after the Taliban regained power. He says the refugee life in Iran forced him to return to Afghanistan. But the Iranian forces did not allow or facilitate his voluntary return to Afghanistan. “I went to be deported across the border, but the Iranian soldiers told me, ‘Go and roam in the streets, then we will arrest you to be deported.’”
After paying a bribe, Firoz managed to add himself to the list of deportees and was transferred to Bakhtiar Dasht refugee camp in Isfahan. There, he says, refugees were forced to pay for rotten food. “The food that was given to us was rotten and smelled bad. It was clear from the labels that they were long past their expiration dates. I complained once, but I was humiliated and beaten by the Iranian soldiers.”
Firoz says that the Iranian forces took 240,000 tomans (about US$5.70) from him to transfer him from Bakhtiar Dasht Camp to Zahedan Camp. “Then, when we arrived at Zahedan Camp, each of us had to pay another 40,000 tomans (US$1) for food. We were in Zahedan for two nights, then when we left for the Nimruz border [area], they took 250,000 tomans (around US$6) from each of us again.”
At the end of July, the Taliban border officials confirmed that the deportation of Afghan refugees from Iran has increased in the previous few months. “In the last one month, deportation of Afghan refugees from Iran has increased and between 1,500 and 2,000 people are deported every day,” Abdul Hai Monib, the Taliban director of the Refugee and Repatriation Department in Herat, told Zan Times in July. Habibullah Elham, the Taliban director of information and culture in Nimruz province provides a similar statistics, saying, “From early June to early July, 50,000 people have been deported from Iran into Nimruz.”
Trying to flee Afghanistan is dangerous. A mother told Amnesty International how her 16-year-old son was fatally shot as they walked away from the Iranian border. “I heard my son screaming for me. He had been hit by two bullets in his ribs. I don’t know what happened after I fainted […] When I gained consciousness, I was in Afghanistan. I saw that my son was dead. I was next to his body in a taxi,” she recounted.
Names have been changed to protect the identity of the interviewees.
