UNHCR: Over 100,000 Afghans Have Returned from Iran Since Start of Current Solar Year

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reports that more than 100,000 Afghans have returned from Iran since the beginning of the current solar year, including 40,000 after the start of recent conflicts there.

UNHCR spokesperson Charlie Goodlike said he visited the border last week with United Nations partners and non-governmental organizations to assess the situation firsthand. Afghan families told him they faced a difficult choice: remain in Iran amid conflicts and destruction or return to Afghanistan, a country many had not seen in years or decades and which faces its own challenges as well as ongoing tensions with Pakistan.

Goodlike assured efforts to provide assistance to the returnees. Alongside forced deportations of Afghan migrants from Iran, military tensions in the country have contributed to the influx.

Returnees have called for support from the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and aid organizations to rebuild their lives. Rahmatullah, who returned from Iran, said: "The situation in Iran is not good; every time in these years, they told us to go to your own country; they forcibly deport us."

Khodadad, another returnee, said: "The rent is excessively high; the situation in Iran is getting worse day by day."

The leader of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, in a message on the occasion of Eid al-Fitr, called on citizens to cooperate and help Afghan migrants returning from neighboring countries.