Afghan refugees in Iran face abuse and exploitation, says report

The Iranian government is splitting up Afghan refugee families, abusing children and subjecting adults to forced labour and beatings as it attempts to reduce the number of people fleeing across the border with Afghanistan, according to a report from Human Rights Watch.

There are between 2.4 million and 3 million Afghans living in Iran, a mix of asylum seekers and economic migrants who mostly lack official documents, according to the report, Unwelcome Guests: Iran's violation of Afghan refugee and migrant rights.

It is one of the largest refugee populations in the world and a strain on the Iranian economy as the country struggles with the fallout from years of sanctions.

But Iran is not meeting its legal obligations, according to the HRW, and has set up a complicated and confusing registration system that leaves even legitimate, long-term refugees liable to deportation.

“Iran is deporting thousands of Afghans to a country where the danger is both real and serious,” said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at HRW.

“Iran has an obligation to hear these people’s refugee claims rather than sweeping them up and tossing them over the border to Afghanistan.”

For some forced out, who fled years ago or were born to refugee parents in Iran, Afghanistan is an alien place where spreading violence and a stumbling economy make resettling difficult. “Afghanistan may be even more dangerous now than when many of these refugees first fled,” Mr Stork added.

Iran has been a refuge for Afghans since the conflict began more than three decades ago. Wages, although meagre, are better than many Afghans could hope to earn at home.

For about 800,000 people with valid refugee papers, there is a chance of a better education for their children and greater freedom for women.

But for the past five years, Iran has refused to let newly arrived Afghans register as asylum seekers, meaning they can be deported more easily.

Conditions have deteriorated, pressures have increased for those already there and they have little recourse when they face abuse. “Human Rights Watch interviewed parents separated from their children during the deportation process with no idea how they would find their children again; young men and women born in Iran and effectively prevented from ever gaining Iranian citizenship being deported to a country they had never visited in their lives,” it said.

In the process of being deported, many are charged unreasonable fees, beaten, forced to work without pay, have cash or valuables stolen by authorities and go without adequate food.

Cases of split families include a couple who had lived in Iran for 10 years who were deported with their baby, but forced to leave behind their three other children aged eight, 10 and 12.

– (Guardian service)