Challenging Neighborhood
According to the 2022 report of the UNHCR, for the seventh consecutive year, Turkey has been the largest host country in the world with nearly 36 million refugees, mostly Syrians. Pakistan and the Islamic Republic of Iran are also among the main hosts of Afghan refugees, the second largest source country and among the top 10 host countries.
Javad Hedayati, the Director-General of the Transit and International Transport Office of the Road Maintenance and Transportation Organization, on April 4, 2022, stated that after the Taliban took over, the daily entry of Afghans into our country from official borders has reached about five thousand people, while this number was between 700 and 800 people per day before the developments in Afghanistan.
In recent years, the government has been repeatedly demanded by the public and civil society organizations to identify, organize, and establish a balance between the statistics of immigrant arrivals and departures. Evidence suggests a lack of capacity or willingness to respond to this demand. During the first electoral competition, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf was the first to mention during one of the debates that a wall will be built for security on the eastern border with Pakistan and Afghanistan.
This election candidate emphasized that illegal immigrants are the root of all serious social problems in the areas of drugs, unemployment, divorce, and all serious problems in the eastern part of the country.
Masoud Pezeshkian also stated in his campaign on Network X that my government, God willing, will take three simultaneous actions regarding Afghan immigrants: 1. Complete closure of borders and prevention of further migration, which will be the main responsibility of the Ministry of Interior.
2. The existing Afghan immigrants should not be denied that a significant number of Afghan brothers play an influential role in Iran’s economy or have sacrificed in the imposed war, but their presence in Iran must be organized and disciplined.
The Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Intelligence have the duty to negotiate with European countries to accept a portion of the immigrants or at least bear the costs of their presence in Iran. The West must take responsibility for what has been done in Afghanistan and has led to the migration of millions of Afghans.
There is no reason for the people of Iran to bear the cost of the wrong policies of others.
Alexander Momeni, the Minister of Interior, also mentioned last Tuesday during presenting his plans to the Islamic Consultative Assembly regarding the issue of Afghan immigrants that one of my top priorities is to pursue the enhancement of border security and the management and organization of foreign nationals’ presence in the country and preventing their illegal entry by implementing the obligations of the Seventh Development Plan based on the establishment of a national migration organization to organize and regulate this important issue, as well as border closure and multilateral cooperation with neighboring countries.
He added that utilizing the leverage of international agreements and empowering institutions and other relevant countries should also be taken seriously in this regard.
History of Hosting
Iran has been hosting Afghan refugees for decades since the time of the war against Soviet occupiers in Afghanistan in the 1980s, while repeatedly criticizing the failure to implement global commitments regarding the issues related to this hosting and warning about the impact of sanctions on the quality of hosting the immigrant community and the consequences of economic problems in the years following the imposition of sanctions against our country.
Hossein Amirabdollahian, the former Foreign Minister, once again emphasized this issue at the World Refugee Congress in Geneva on December 13, 2023, and stated that our hospitable hosting of refugees is taking place while Iran itself is under the most severe inhumane and illegal sanctions by the United States.
Unlawful sanctions, by diminishing the capacity and exerting pressure on humanitarian aid organizations, obstruct them from fulfilling their duty of providing assistance to those in need in countries under sanctions.
The former Foreign Minister also reiterated the warning of the Islamic Republic regarding the wave of migration to the West in this speech and emphasized the responsibility of the Taliban in this regard. He added that in such circumstances, it cannot be expected that the Islamic Republic of Iran will continue to provide satisfactory services to the large population of refugees, many of whom are seeking to migrate to Europe.
The issue of Afghan refugees will not be resolved without their return to their homeland.
In this regard, it is necessary for the United Nations, neighboring countries, assisting countries, and other relevant parties to collaborate effectively to help Afghanistan create suitable economic, security, and political infrastructures in order to attract refugees back to their own country.
The main responsibility lies with the governing authorities in Afghanistan.
Common pain.
Pakistan, as a country that has faced the Afghan migrant crisis alongside Iran in recent years, has set a one-month deadline for the voluntary exit of approximately 17 million unauthorized Afghan citizens from its northern neighbor following the start of a new wave of migration, as per the directive dated 07/11/1402. After this deadline, Pakistan will proceed to identify, detain, and deport illegal Afghan migrants from its territory.
Islamabad has declared one of the main objectives of this action to be the fight against terrorism. According to statistics released by the Pakistani government, since the Taliban came to power in Afghanistan, terrorist attacks by the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in this country have increased by 60%, resulting in the deaths of over 2,200 people.
Asef Durrani, Pakistan’s special representative for Afghanistan, recently warned of another 9/11-like incident originating from Afghanistan.
Asef Durrani further added that Afghanistan has almost been forgotten; there is no doubt about it. This was actually emphasized during the third Doha meeting in June, stating that humanitarian aid is not at a satisfactory level, and even last year, only half of the commitments were fulfilled.
He also warned that the presence of various terrorist groups, including ISIS Khorasan, poses a major challenge for the region and beyond. He added his concern that ISIS is growing inside Afghanistan, which should be a source of concern for everyone in the region and beyond due to their attacks in Iran, Moscow, and also within Pakistan. If such a thing can happen here, it can happen elsewhere as well.
The government of Pakistan has announced that last year, in the first phase of the forced repatriation program, they successfully returned over half a million undocumented Afghan migrants to their country.
Islamabad also stated that in the month of Farvardin, they will begin the second phase of the forced repatriation process for Afghan migrants without valid documents.
Some reports even suggest that Pakistan may expel Afghan migrants more extensively in the second phase, which may include Afghans with valid documents as well.
Security Challenges
The fight against terrorism has not been the sole concern of the Pakistani government regarding Afghan immigrants, and the Islamic Republic of Iran has also been hit by the entry of terrorists into its territory over the past three years. On July 14th, the Ministry of Intelligence announced the arrest and transfer of one of the main designers and perpetrators of the two explosions on Thursday, December 4, 2023, during the fourth anniversary ceremony of martyr Qassem Soleimani in Kerman province, named Behnam Abdullah Kuwaiti, into the country.
According to this, the designer of the terrorist incident in Kerman was one of the senior commanders of the Taliban and ISIS in Afghanistan and played a significant role in leading and guiding this group. ISIS claimed responsibility for these explosions in their statements and announced that two members of this group had carried out suicide bombings.
The Ministry of Intelligence’s statement regarding the details of the terrorist incident in Shahcheragh also mentions that in the operations related to this event, 26 Takfiri elements were arrested, the majority of whom were non-Iranian and from nationalities ranging from the Republic of Azerbaijan to Tajikistan and Afghanistan.
In the statement, it was announced that the perpetrator of the terrorist operation entered Iran from countries such as Tajikistan, Turkey, and Pakistan, received training in Badakhshan province, Afghanistan, and illegally entered the country from the eastern borders.
In another terrorist attack on 5 April 2022, an individual attacked three students with a knife at the Imam Reza Shrine in Iran.
One of the students, named Mohammad Aslani, succumbed to his injuries. The attacker, based on statements from relevant authorities, was affiliated with a Takfiri group.
These terrorist incidents occur despite the 13th government’s claim that Afghan immigrants do not pose a security challenge to Iran.
According to the 15th report of the UN monitoring group, under the Taliban’s control, Afghanistan has become a safe haven for terrorist groups like ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and the Afghan Taliban.
The report expresses concerns about the security situation in Iran, Pakistan, and other countries in the Middle East region due to the exodus of ISIS-Khorasan members from Afghanistan. It also states that the largest terrorist group in Afghanistan currently is the Pakistani Taliban.
The report estimates the strength of the Pakistani Taliban to be around 6,000 to 6,500 fighters and notes that they are currently the largest group among approximately ten groups operating freely in Afghanistan under the Taliban’s supervision.
A United Nations report reveals that NATO weapons have fallen into the hands of the Taliban in Pakistan after the coalition forces withdrew from Afghanistan.
Vladimir Voronkov, the UN Under-Secretary-General for Counter-Terrorism, has stated in his latest remarks that ISIS-Khorasan has improved its financial and logistical capabilities over the past six months with the support of diaspora communities of Afghan and Central Asian migrants.
Concerns have risen that Afghanistan may once again become a haven for terrorism in the region, especially after the leader of Al-Qaeda, living with his family in Kabul, was killed in a US drone strike a few months after the Taliban returned to power.
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