Thousands of Afghan refugees in Pakistan and Iran are in misery and under the pressure of the violent behavior of the police of these countries. These asylum seekers, who have sought refuge in these two countries due to the fear of Taliban retaliation, increasing poverty and unemployment, and pursuing immigration cases to Western countries, are highly exposed to violence and forced deportation.
The police of Iran and Pakistan arrest, torture and deport hundreds of people every day and in this process, they blackmail them and ignore their rights to stay as a refugee in respective countries and humiliated their dignity.
The immigrants who have taken refuge in these two countries say that they do not have any kind of legal immunity and police forcefully and violently deport them whenever they want. Some refugees were deported even with the legal stay documents, and there is no accountable institution to hear their voices.
Some asylum seekers, who work in Iran, say that their employers sometimes do not pay their salaries and threaten to hand them over to the police if they demand their salaries.
After the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, thousands of Afghans, who have sought refuge in Iran and Pakistan due to the fear of Taliban revenge, increasing poverty and unemployment, and pursuing immigration cases in Western countries, are severely facing the violent behavior of the police of these two countries and say that their lives and property are not protected in these countries.
According to them, Afghan refugees in these two countries are severely discriminated, oppressed and misbehaved, and the police of Iran and Pakistan, despite extortion and blackmail, forcefully and violently deport them.
Pakistani police even mistreat even Afghans who have legal stay doucments
Farkhunda, one of the Afghan refugees, said that the Pakistani government should treat the Afghans in Pakistan like citizens of other countries who travel to this country with visas and legal documents.
“We traveled to Pakistan with a visa,” she says. We experienced a lot of pain in our homeland and we came to Pakistan with hope. We are Muslims and Pakistanis are also Muslims, so we expect them to treat us as Muslims as Mulims are brother and sister to each other.”
Another Afghan refugee in Pakistan, Ajmal said that he is fed up with the pressure of the Pakistani police. He furthered: “All our words are about the Pakistani police. Women, men and children all talk about the police and think about them. Police behavior is inhumane.”
On the one hand, people’s spirits are ruined due to the suspension of their cases, and on the other hand, the police have made their times bitter. “They (police) all come around every day and now they go around in plain clothes, which makes the situation more complicated and makes it difficult to identify them. We don’t know what to do.”
Meanwhile, following the suspension of the US refugee program, Pakistan has intensified the pressure on Afghan refugees who have gone to this country to process their immigration cases.
Pakistan Prime Minister, Shahbaz Sharif has recently ordered that Afghan Identity Card (ACC) holders should immediately leave Islamabad and Rawalpindi and be deported to Afghanistan along with other undocumented migrants.
According to the order of Sharif, Afghan immigrants who have gone to this country for resettlement in third countries, must leave these two states by March 31, 2025.
Afghans working in different Iranian companies complain of not receiving their wages
Meanwhile, a number of Afghan refugees who work in different cities of Iran say that in addition to the discriminatory and violent behavior of the police, they also face abuse from their employers.
According to them, Iranian employers in some areas do not pay their wages at the end of the month and warn that if they ask for their salaries, they will be handed over to the police to be fired. These asylum seekers remain silent because of the fear to be deported back to Afghanistan.
One of the asylum seekers in Iran, who does not want to be named, says that more than 10 million Iranian money of his salary remained with his Iranian employer, which has not been paid to yet.
“Imagine a person with all the problems, leaving his/her homeland, and being away from his parents and children, going through countless sufferings, and after going through many dangers, such as a car overturning and passing through difficult obstacles, he arrives in Iran. Enduring all this suffering and working from eight in the morning to five in the evening, he sweats with pox-ridden hands in the scorching heat of summer and the cold of winter, but in the end, the Iranian employer does not even pay his meager salary,” he lamented.
On the other hand, Afghan refugees in Iran, in addition to forced deportation, are also prohibited from employment in many jobs in this country. Iranian authorities have ordered employers to refrain from hiring Afghan immigrant citizens in various jobs and only employ them in a few sectors such as construction and hard work.
Also, shops and restaurants that employ non-Iranian workers will be closed.
Earlier, the International Organization for Migration reported that from January to December 2024, more than 1.2 million migrants returned to Afghanistan, of which 67pc were deported. According to this organization, approximately four million Afghan citizens have sought refuge in Iran, but Iranian officials claim that the number of these migrants reaches eight million.
Afghan refugees in Pakistan and Iran face many problems. Many families do not have the ability to send their children to schools and universities and are not recruited in government institutions. According to the refugees, in the last three years, thousands of migrant children have been deprived of education and live in complete uncertainty. They expect that the western countries, especially the United States, will not leave them in this situation and take action to evacuate them in other countries.