Monitoring Desk
KABUL: The Taliban administration has expressed concerns with Tehran over difficulties faced by Afghan refugees in Iran, a Taliban official said on Sunday.
Iran has for decades hosted millions of Afghan refugees fleeing armed conflict in their country.
Around 600,000 Afghan passport holders live in Iran, and nearly 780,000 are registered as refugees, according to 2022 data from UN High Commissioner for Refugees. At the same time, 2.1 million Afghans are still undocumented.
The number of Afghans crossing into Iran had increased since 2021 when the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, and international sanctions slapped on their administration shattered the country’s economy. Many have since been forcibly expelled from Iran back to Afghanistan, and reports of their abuse at the hands of Iranian security forces have increased.
Afghan authorities raise concerns over refugees’ plight
Several social media footages emerged since last year, with reports of abuse not only by the Iranian police but also by criminals and human traffickers.
“There is no doubt that Afghan nationals have faced several problems in neighboring Iran,” a spokesman for the Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation, Abdul Mutalib Haqqani, told Arab News on Sunday.
“We have talked to Iranian authorities and shared concerns and problems of Afghans with them,” Haqqani said. “One of the problems is that a large number of Afghans have been forcibly expelled from Iran.”
Iranian security forces have illegally killed at least 11 Afghans, according to a report by Amnesty International published last August, which also documented the forced returns and torture of Afghans.
However, those reports have not deterred Afghans from seeking a better life in Iran, said social activist Dr. Azad.
“Around 80 percent of Herat residents have been living in economic problems and poverty,” he maintained. “Almost a member of each family from Herat province travels to neighboring Iran to find work until they can provide food for their family.
However, problems faced by Afghan refugees in Iran are multiple and do not always directly involve Iranian authorities, said an Afghan activist Attaullah Khogyani.
