Esquire: Death on the Iranian Border

Life in Afghanistan is so hard, people have been fleeing to Iran in search of jobs. But in doing so, some are paying the ultimate price.

November 5, 2007

ISLAM QALA, Afghanistan — The people of Islam Qala, a border town where Iran meets Afghanistan, say a man was killed here last night. He was making a run for Iran a few miles up, and they shot him. He will not make the news; with all the dying in Afghanistan and the black cloud of nuclear rhetoric hanging over Iran, there is little concern left for a man trying to travel in between.

The mass deportations started in the spring, thousands of Afghans rounded up and trucked to the border. 100,000 people in the first two months. Families were separated, stories surfaced of legal immigrants having their papers torn up, of beatings, intimidation, and theft. And still, Afghans are desperate enough for jobs in Iran to try swimming upstream.

“Afghanistan is a bad country because we don’t have any money, you can’t do anything.” Esmatullah is the driver dispatched to take me from Herat to Iran. He’s finely groomed and neatly dressed in jeans and a blazer; he could be selling slacks at Saks 5th Avenue. But people invest in dress because to make money here you have to look like you have it, and despite the means suggested by his outfit, waiting at home for Esmatullah is a sick wife whose medication he cannot afford. He has a son as well, two-year-old Navid. “It means good times,” he says. Whether the boy’s name was divined before, after, or — my best guess — during conception, he won’t say.

And so we find ourselves in an old car with a cracked windshield and broken air conditioner, cruising westward through the desert, past the ruins of castles built centuries ago and refugee camps built within my lifetime. There is no human presence for as far as the limits of human vision — and the mountains miles away — allow us to see, only the empty, weather-beaten encampments whose color so resembles that of the terrain they seems to have risen from the earth in a single moment of terrestrial agitation.

Then there is a girl, not more than nine years old, wearing a red dress and walking alone in front of the walls. Her dress tugs at her as the wind tugs at it, pulling her forward faster than she’d like to go so that she has to lean back into the wind. So much life having already moved through these refugee camps, her presence appears purely spectral.

“You are lucky,” Esmatullah says. “You have a nice city. See my city, my country?” He lowers his head; squints. “In your country, people are free. Do you know what it means, ‘free?’ It means you don’t have to do some actions because the government says. We can’t have girlfriend, womens can’t go out without chadr, do you know what it is, chadr? Womens can’t wear any clothes that they want.”

In the eyes of the Afghans, Iran’s society is free, its infrastructure sophisticated (and intact), and its opportunities attractive. And that the people on this side are called Afghan rather than Iranian is only arbitrary; one of the many geopolitical residues of the Great Game. The borders were drawn with a typically colonial disregard for ethnic nuance and an eye instead toward creating a buffer state between the Brits and the Tsarists, so now rival tribes share a national identity, while a family finds itself separated in two different countries. Here, Sunni Tajiks of the same parentage reside on either side of chain-links and razor wire.

As you move further west along the road to Iran, the pretext of an Afghan national identity withers, and Iran’s industrial reach presents itself. We drive toward the border on an Iranian-built road; we are escorted by Iranian-built power lines. In the distance, orange dump trucks glide across the desert as if they belong there. Esmatullah says that they’re building a railroad, that although Iran is kicking Afghans out they want to keep selling to Afghanistan. “It is the person that is, how do you say? Two-faced.” Still, Esmatullah would be in Iran at a moment’s notice if he could. “I wanted to leave Afghanistan but I couldn’t. The situation was very bad for learning, for business, I couldn’t finish school. It’s like a dream for me every time that I go somewhere, where I can learn new language, computer programs, but it’s a wish. How many countries have you been to?”

As we near Iran and the border towns, sand spilled from the desert creeps across the road. A man stands on the asphalt with his hands on a shovel. He lifts a pile of sand, flicks his wrist and lets the wind do the rest, carrying the cloud of swirling dust over the road. A small boy holds out his hand for alms. They’re not part of any government road maintenance team, they’re just Afghans jobless here and unwanted elsewhere, serving as a makeshift municipality borne from Afghanistan’s signature brand of desperate entrepreneurialism. But no one stops to pay; the child is an unintimidating taxman. The boy and the man watch us drive by.

We pass them at eighty miles per hour and we’d be going faster if we weren’t into the wind. The road is good, a rarity for this country, and we have it to ourselves. Then there is a car with Iranian plates brushing by us on the right, two wheels catching the sand and sending the car swerving; it fishtails for fifty meters, and then regains control and jets off, out of sight in an instant. A ripple of action on a piece of land devoid of life, through which people pass on their way somewhere else but seldom stay. “Maybe he is afraid of Afghanistan,” Esmatullah says with a smile. “He is an a rush to get home.” A few moments later, a border police pickup truck passes on the left.

For those conspiratorially inclined, Iran presents plenty of fodder. There was the shipment of hi-tech roadside bombs from Iran intercepted in Afghanistan last month, booty that had Western pundits wondering rhetorically how Tehran could possibly not know about weapons moving under their noses.

There is poetry in the accusations. Iran using Afghanistan to fight America the same way America once used Afghanistan to fight the Soviets — as a remote playing field where the enemy’s blood can be let by your weapons in someone else’s hands. And there is the curious pattern here; it is mostly men being deported through Islam Qala. Iran’s border with Afghanistan extends to Nimroz and Farah provinces, border crossings near no airport and accessible by no safe road. It’s nearly impossible for any journalist to get there to document soldiers pushing people from busses, and, whether by coincidence or not, those are the places where the women and children are let off.

The impact of a sudden surge of unskilled workers and resource — draining refugees on an already unstable country is predictable. There are no jobs for them. They can sweep sand from the road and watch people drive by. They can also join the insurgency, or fund it by farming poppy. It’s the West with its shoulder against the wall trying to keep the whole thing from toppling over, so we hear that all of it — the bombs, the mass deportations — are part of hot potato concocted by Iran to keep the international community distracted from its nuclear ambitions. Iran meanwhile asks why they should have to drain their subsidized health care and compound their own job shortage to accommodate Afghans, especially given that Western countries have effectively closed their doors to Afghan refugees. The government of Afghanistan maintains that their relations with Iran are amiable. From here, it looks like Iran has deflected the economic impacts of American-imposed sanctions onto one of America’s own clients.

There are a number of checkpoints as we near Iran. Soldiers open the trunk, they look through our things, Esmatullah shows them my ISAF press credentials, we move on. At one stop Esmatullah talks congenially to one of the officers, who lets us pass without a search. “It’s about security, to make sure there’s no bomb, but he’s my friend.”

When we reach the gates of the border, it is late afternoon, and it is quiet. Men walk into Afghanistan through the fenced-in corridor that connects the two countries, accompanied by porters carrying their bags who, for having been born on this side, will never see the other. There is an “Afghan Duty Free Shop.” Parked nearby is a bus that has “Tourism Germany,” written on the side. The guards swap out, carrying their dented teapots with them. We get out of the car, walk around, take pictures. Someone says 160 people were deported yesterday, but there is little happening now. We talk to some people, and then we turn around and head back to Herat.

On the way back, the sun is setting. The Herati sunset is Mother Nature’s muse to Persian poets, its charm inspiring greats like Jami, the last great lyricist in classical Persian. And everything on the way between Islam Qala and Herat is oriented toward Persia. The Iranian-built road; the Iranian-built power lines; the domed huts built for centuries with chimneys tilted westward to catch the wind from Iran for cooling; the makeshift antennas jerry-rigged to the roofs to grab Iranian television channels.

As we drive on with the sun fading behind us, cars begin pulling over. Their occupants climb out, lay their prayer rugs down on the side of road, and begin their bows toward Mecca. Which here in Afghanistan, is also toward Iran.

IRIN: Tehran expels 8,000 Afghans

HERAT, 5 November 2007 (IRIN) – The government of Afghanistan has called on Iran to stop deporting thousands of Afghan citizens without work permits or refugee status, Afghanistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs told IRIN on 5 November.

“Afghanistan is particularly vulnerable to any mass deportation during winter,” said Sultan Ahmad Baheen, a spokesman for the ministry, adding that the country lacked the capacity to integrate a large number of deportees.

In April and May this year, Iranian authorities deported thousands of Afghans – a move that caused a humanitarian problem for ill-prepared Afghanistan.

Iran slowed down the expulsions after the government of President Hamid Karzai, the UN and several other international organisations criticised the move and called for a more gradual deportation process.

However, Afghan officials in western Herat province, bordering Iran, say the deportations have restarted in the past 10 days, with at least 500 Afghans being sent home daily.

“Since 23 October, about 8,000 people have been deported from Iran to Herat province,” said Shamsuddin Hamid, director of the provincial department of refugee and returnee affairs.

The Iranian embassy in Kabul declined to comment on the issue.

Vulnerable deportees

Most deportees are young, single men who migrated to Iran mostly in search of employment and economic opportunities, aid agencies say.

Provincial officials, however, are concerned that hundreds of women, children and elderly people have also been evicted.

“There are deported women whose husbands still remain in Iran,” Hamid told IRIN. “There are also deported men whose children and wives are left in Iran,” he added.

UN agencies have helped Afghan authorities set up two transition centres in Nemroz and Herat provinces where deportees receive assistance and shelter for up to 48 hours. Some also receive help to reach their final destinations inside the country, according to the UN.

Refugees and “illegal migrants”

The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) says there are more than 900,000 registered Afghan refugees in Iran. The government has given assurances it will not force Afghan refugees to return home, UNHCR has confirmed.

However, the large numbers of Afghans who do not have refugee status and are considered illegal are not protected by UNHCR.

Since 2002, about four million Afghans – three million from Pakistan and about 850,000 from Iran – have been repatriated to Afghanistan with UN help, according to UNHCR.

Meanwhile, at least 35 people, allegedly with valid refugee identity cards, have also been deported to Herat in the past 10 days, provincial officials said.

Salvatore Lombardo, head of UNHCR mission in Afghanistan, said the organisation was verifying these reports.

Iran has reportedly ordered all foreigners, including thousands of Afghan refugees, to leave Sistan and Baluchestan province.

AIP: Afghan official says Iran forcefully repatriating refugees

Text of report in English by private Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press news agency

Herat: Iran has forcefully repatriated approximately 35 Afghan families during the past some days, an Afghan official alleged Wednesday (31 October).

The Iran government has once again started forced repatriation of Afghan refugees and during the last some days 120 members of 35 families have been forcefully repatriated to the bordering Herat Province of Afghanistan, said Shamsuddin Hamad, director of refugees in Herat.

They were forced to repatriate despite the fact that they had valid documents to live in Iran, he told Afghan Islamic Press, adding that some have left behind parents, brothers while the others wives and husbands.

He said, “We demand of the Iran government to delay this process a few months as the weather is cold here and the Afghan government does not have resources to provide necessary facilities to the repatriated families.”

The refugee director sad they had taken up the matter with Iranian consular but feared human tragedy if Iran did not stop the forced repatriation immediately.

A man who was forcefully repatriated from Iran while talking to Afghan Islamic Press said, “My family live in Iran and have valid documents but police arrested me [and I was] forcefully repatriated.”

A woman named Marhaba said she was also forcefully repatriated while her husband was still in Iran.

Iran had also reportedly forcefully repatriated large numbers of Afghan refugee which cause numerous problems for Afghan government.

[Description of Source: Peshawar Afghan Islamic Press in English -- Peshawar-based agency, staffed by Afghans. The agency used to have good contacts with Taliban leadership; however, since the fall of the Taliban regime, it now describes itself as independent and self-financing. OSC IAP20071031950074 1323 GMT 31 Oct 07]

Spanta calls for “gradual, honorable, voluntary” repatriation of Afghan refugees in Iran

Afghanistan wants voluntary repatriation of refugees from Iran

Text of unattributed report, entitled: “Afghanistan is unable to receive huge number of Afghan refugees expelled from Iran” published in independent Afghan newspaper Rah-e Nejat on September 20, 2007

Addressing a news conference in Kabul yesterday, Dr Rangin Dadfar-Spanta, foreign minister of Afghanistan, said Afghan refugees should be repatriated honourably and voluntarily. He said: “Afghanistan is unable to receive huge numbers of Afghan refugees expelled from Iran.”

According to a social reporter of Rah-e Nejat, Spanta continued that Afghanistan wants Afghans be repatriated gradually, honourably and voluntarily from Iran, but not in a compulsory way.

The foreign minister stated that Iran should act based on commitments made to the Afghan refugees living in Iran and it should repatriate them gradually and honourably in cooperation with the Afghan government.

Spanta said that he had stressed in his meetings with the president and foreign minister of Iran that the Afghan refugees should be repatriated honourably and voluntarily and grounds should be prepared for the return of Afghan students graduated from Iranian universities to Afghanistan.

Spanta also added that in these meetings, he had discussed the issue of speeding up the construction of the Khawaf-Herat railway, road building and development and reconstruction projects funded by Iran in Afghanistan.

It is worth noting that the forcible repatriation of Afghan refugees from Iran early this year resulted in disqualification of Foreign Minister Dr Spanta and Refugee Affairs Minister Mohammad Akbar Akbar by parliament and in start of a dispute between parliament and the government.

It is worth mentioning that over 220,000 Afghan refugees have been expelled from Iran so far.

[Description of Source: Kabul Rah-e Nejat in Dari --An eight-page independent daily in hardcopy and internet versions. The Kabul-based paper was launched after the fall of the Taliban by MP Alemi Balkhi. Often publishes editorials and articles on corruption, foreign relations, politics, security, drugs, religion and reconstruction. Generally supportive of the government and the presence of NATO forces in Afghanistan, but can be critical of government policies. Languages: Dari (mainly), Pashto. Circulation: unknown. URL: www.rahenenatdaily.com OSC IAP20070921950060 Kabul Rah-e Nejat in Dari 0000 GMT 20 Sep 07]