...back at the shouting match, the spittle had reached unprecedented levels...
...the decaying remnant of the Ottoman Empire...
continues its policy of repatriating refugees.
Since the Taliban
...Arabic for
students...
came back to power, tens of thousands of desperate people have fled Afghanistan, making their way into and across Iran
...They hate and Turkey. Here Afghan refugees have faced abuses and violence as well as kidnappings for ransom.
One of them is Sami, not his real name. Like many others, he fled Kabul when the Taliban came back, reaching Turkey, where he was deported. His story highlights a growing problem, that of
"Afghans aren’t familiar with the area, so they find themselves in tiny villages where they become easy prey for gunnies," Sami explained.
Such men have formed gangs who can consist of just a few people and demand as little as US$ 500. They take advantage of exhausted refugees who walked for weeks through rough, mountainous terrain in Iran before entering unfamiliar areas in Turkey.
"They find Afghans at their weakest points, when they are tired, hungry, and lost," Sami noted. "Even if it’s ten Afghans against only two or three of the criminals, the Afghans are too tired and weak to try and fight back."
While Turkey continues to send refugees back, hundreds in January alone, with some 5,000 set to leave coming days, videos of Afghans held for ransom have begun to appear.
In one video, a group of young Afghan men cower by a rock face, hands tied behind their backs. One of them, gagged, is threatened with a large combat knife, which then slices down his ear. In another, topless Afghan men, chained together, kneeling on sand, cry and plead as they are whipped with a belt.
Ali Hekmat, who has been aiding Afghan refugees in Turkey for more than a decade, told Middle East Eye that he has heard countless stories of criminal gangs abusing Afghans, particularly near the Iranian border.
Most Afghans try to enter Turkey without documentation, so there are no accurate statistics, but a constant flow of messages from Afghans held for ransom makes its way to families after they were captured by kidnappers.
More than a year and a half after the Taliban came back to Kabul, Afghan refugees are still a source of deep concern since so many travel a risky route through Iran and Turkey in an attempt to reach Europe, the United States or Australia.
NGOs report scores of cases involving arrests, abuses and deaths, picked up by media, like the migrant who froze to death in an attempt to cross the
A source told AsiaNews that "many people" have died along the border in a "desperate attempt" to start a new life away from the Taliban after their introduced a sleuth of restrictions inspired by Islamic law (Shar’ia).