Afghans fleeing Taliban for Iran cause traffic jams in desert
THOUSANDS of Afghans are attempting to flee the Taliban takeover and escape into neighbouring Iran each day, in an exodus joined by many former government officials and civil servants.
Researchers have seen an “exponential rise” in the number of people trying to get out via Zaranj in the south-western province of Nimroz.
Video shared on social media has shown long traffic jams through the desert.
Both Pakistan and Iran have tried to lock their borders but Afghans are paying people smugglers to get them out.
The Taliban has imposed a levy of up to £8 on each pick-up truck of migrants making the crossing with Pakistani and Iranian police also accused of taking a cut from the trade.
Residents and travellers said that as many as 5,000 people per day have been trying to get out of Afghanistan via Nimroz in the past week. The world’s biggest economies yesterday held an emergency G20 summit to try to deal with the crisis in Afghanistan as the Taliban held its first face-to-face talks with a US-EU delegation in Qatar.
Sultan Mohammad Parwani, 23, who was a policeman in Jabal Siraj north of Kabul, before August’s Taliban takeover, said: “We face starvation and an unknown fate. The way we travel, every day there are clashes and other security and criminal incidents.
“The smugglers are cruel, they sell us to each other, they collect all the money and there is no guarantee we will get to our destination.”
David Mansfield, a researcher who studies black market and opium smuggling routes, said the numbers of migrants leaving Zaranj had “increased exponentially”.
He added: “Reports indicate most are ex-employees of the former republic, some leaving along with their families, highlighting the desperate situation for many in Afghanistan.”
Mohammad Mansoor, a former civil servant from Farah province, said he had made it to the far south-western corner of Afghanistan and paid about £250 to Baloch tribesmen to smuggle him and his family out.
“There is no hope for the future. We are preparing for the journey in a way that there is no hope at all and we may be able to reach our goal and we may not be able to,“he said.
Asadullah Khaliqi, a doctor at a hospital in Zaranj, said many of the packed vehicles crossing the border had serious road accidents.
“Many of those fleeing seem to be facing economic problems, security problems, and wanting to find work abroad,” he added.