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Quetta, Pakistan—— When the Taliban captured Mazar-i-Sharif in northern Afghanistan, Ferozan knew that her life in the country was over and she would have to flee her home with her husband and two young children.
“There is another war, and I am very scared,” she said. “We decided to take the escape route and come here.”
Like thousands of others, Ferozan—like many Afghans who have only one name—fleeed to neighboring Pakistan in the east. They now face an uncertain future, in a country where government officials say they cannot accept more refugees and have begun to expel some newcomers.
“The Balochistan government and the federal government have decided that there are already three to four million Afghan refugees in Pakistan,” said Liaquat Shahwani, a spokesperson for the Balochistan government. Most of the new Afghan refugees Has arrived in Pakistan.
“We can’t bear the burden. Why do we need more newcomers? There are other neighboring countries where they can go.”
Provincial official Jummadad Khan Mandhokhail told Al Jazeera that at least 250 new Afghan refugees have been deported since the arrival of new people after the fall of the Afghan government on August 15.
Shawani said: “We have returned them because the Pakistani government has not established any camps to facilitate the Afghan refugees.” “Our decision is that we will not allow them now.”
Ferozan (left) said that she just hopes that her ordeal will end so that her children can continue to receive education and strive to live a better life [Saadullah Akhtar/Al Jazeera]Nowhere to go
As a member of the Hazara ethnic group with the third largest population in Afghanistan, Ferozan and her family believe that they will face greater threats under the leadership of the Taliban. People commit atrocities.
The armed group captured Mazar-i-Sharif on August 14 and took complete control of the capital Kabul a day later. It targeted members of the Hazara ethnic group, most of whom were Shia Muslims, and carried out a series of targeted massacres and killings. Explosion attack. Decades.
In August, the human rights organization Amnesty International found evidence that Taliban fighters killed 9 Hazaras after taking control of Ghazni Province between July 4 and 6.
In recent years, armed groups from the Islamic State of ISIL (ISIS) have also targeted the Hazara in Afghanistan as the target of major bombing attacks.
Since the fall of the Afghan government last month, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has estimated that more than 9,290 new refugees have arrived in Pakistan, of which more than 90% arrived through the southern border crossing between the Afghan town of Spinboldak Pakistan. And the town of Chaman in Pakistan.
According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, it is estimated that more than 30% of those arriving are of Hazara ethnicity.
“I am homeless, come here,” Ferozan said. “My requirement from the government is that they must help us and take us somewhere. We live in a mosque, without clothes, blankets, and nothing else.”
Ferozan and more than 100 other refugees live in the Rizvia Mosque in Quetta, the capital of Balochistan province in southwestern Pakistan, which is about 100 kilometers (62 miles) from the Chaman border crossing.
Dozens of families sleep on carpets, which are spread on the floor of the main prayer hall of the mosque. A small tent is used to separate the space between men and women. As Ferozan and other refugees told about their experience of crossing the border, several young children played around them.
“I ask the government to help us and hold the hand of our poor. How long will we have to wander like this, and how long will we have to face war?” Ferozan asked.
For Zakia, another 40-year-old new refugee, the journey to Pakistan was arduous. Amidst the chaos and body crushing at the border controlled by the Taliban, she said she had lost contact with her 45-year-old brother.
Zakia, first from right, his family is from Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan. He said that when the Taliban controlled the city, the people there were “scared” [Saadullah Akhtar/Al Jazeera]“When I can pass [the border crossing], My brother was left behind,” she said. “When that happened, I stayed in Charman for one night [on the Pakistani side of the border], I slept on the roof of a shop because there was no space and no room. “
After waiting hours in the hot summer sun, Zakia and her family of seven were forced to leave Chaman and seek refuge in the nearest major city, Quetta.
Zakia’s family is from Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan. She said that when the Taliban controlled the city, people there “feeled scared.”
“I’m here for my children,” she said. “I came for their education, because in the Taliban era, there will be no good education that they can learn and get. [white-collar] Work. “
Zakia’s husband Safiullah, 43 years old, was injured in an attack on a Shiite mosque in Kabul a few years ago and he was unable to walk.
“Come here, I have nothing,” he said. “No income, no food, no home, the rent here is so high, I have no rent. I don’t even have a floor.”
Muhammad Ali Muhammadi, 28, was a university lecturer in Mazar-i-Sharif before fleeing to Pakistan.
“We face two dangers: one is our life, the other is [the danger] unemployment. So we can’t stay there anymore,” he said.
“I was a kid when the Taliban first came to power [in 1996]The events we saw in that era… They were very bad. I don’t want my children to see the dark days that I see. “
Mohammedi said that although the new Taliban government promises that all people enjoy tolerance and basic rights, he doubts these claims.
“Who wants to leave his country? I want to go back there. But the current government there, we don’t trust them, we don’t know when they will start being unfair to us again.”
According to UNHCR data, Pakistan currently hosts more than 1.4 million registered Afghan refugees, and an estimated 2 million people live in the country without official documents. [Saadullah Akhtar/Al Jazeera]Pakistan will “no longer accept any refugees”
According to UNHCR data, Pakistan currently hosts more than 1.4 million registered Afghan refugees, and an estimated 2 million people live in the country without official documents.
These include refugees who have lived in the country for more than 30 years, who first fled the Soviet invasion and the 1979 war, the civil war that followed, and the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.
During the crisis, Pakistan facilitated the international evacuation of Afghanistan. Government officials estimated that at least 13,000 people—mainly third-country citizens from the United States, Europe, and other places—traveled through Pakistan by plane or road to reach safety.
However, officials said the country will not accept any new refugees.
Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan’s national security adviser, Moyd Youssef, said at a press conference last week: “Pakistan now has no conditions to accept more refugees.”
“We will do our best for our Afghan brothers and sisters, but the world must take up this responsibility to ensure that we prevent a humanitarian crisis from happening.”
Yusuf said that the international community should assist in the establishment of “safe areas” in Afghanistan for people displaced by the conflict.
Provincial officials in Pakistan’s Balochistan province also expressed this view, saying that no new refugee camps have been established on the Pakistani border side.
The provincial government spokesman Shawani said: “In any emergency, if a camp must be established, it should be established on the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan… on the Afghan side.”
“The Balochistan government will do our best and we will work hard to facilitate them.”
Resettlement in a third country
Most of the new refugees interviewed by Al Jazeera said that they are aware of the difficulties of living in Pakistan and are seeking resettlement in a third country.
“Refugees cannot be accommodated here because there are already many immigrants in Pakistan. We are looking for a home but cannot find it,” said Sakina, another 25-year-old refugee who lives in the Rizvia mosque.
“We ask the United Nations to take us to some developed countries, where we can live in peace with our children.”
Muhammad Zia, a 50-year-old shopkeeper from Kabul, said that returning to Afghanistan is impossible, and the world’s major powers should help refugees resettle elsewhere.
“We have young children and no jobs [in Afghanistan],” he said. “Our request comes from international countries and embassies, and these countries should give us citizenship and help. “
Ferozan said she just hopes that her ordeal will end so that her children can continue to receive education and strive to live a better life.
“Our requirement of this government is that no matter what they do, no matter what they do, let us get rid of this pain,” she said. “Take us to a different country and hold our hand.”
Sakina, a young woman from Mazar-e-Sharif, said her mother told her the story of her life under the former Taliban regime, when the country had a strict interpretation of Islamic law and women were almost prohibited from participating in public life.
“What the Taliban said, what they promised, they will never take action,” she said. “That’s why we don’t trust them.”
“I don’t want to see the difficulties my mother saw when I was young in her life.”
Additional reporting by Al Jazeera’s digital correspondent in Islamabad, Asad Hashim
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