A People in need of a future

Emma Poole
Calgary Herald

An Afghani refugee in the sun set light at the tent village of Mile 46 Refugee Camp, located in S.W. Afghanistan, 2 km east of the Iranian border in the Margow Desert.

The dream is of home. The nightmare is not knowing when, if ever, there will be any chance of a return there . . . and, if so, a return to what.

The Afghans in the camps are caught in the classic refugee dilemma: trapped between the grim reality that has become their present "temporary" lives, and the terrifying uncertainty whether anything of their past remains to somehow help make their future better.

The current refugee crisis in Afghanistan isn't the first time millions of desperate people have rushed toward neighbouring borders to escape war.

It is estimated that during the nine-year Soviet occupation of Afghanistan which ended in 1989, more than six million people fled the country, landing mostly in Pakistan and Iran.

There are roughly 1.5 million refugees still living in slums and makeshift camps in Iran alone, global authorities on the subject of refugees estimate.

Now the latest round of bloodshed and devastation within Afghanistan's borders has left shattered locals wondering how they can possibly rebuild and move on.

A male Afghan refugee walking in the Mile 46 refugee camp in S.W. Afghanistan.

"We are all scared. Our homes are destroyed and we don't know when it will be safe to return home," said 60- year-old Barkzi Bakhatavar.

She walked for 15 days from a small town near the former Taliban stronghold of Kandahar before arriving at Mile 46 refugee camp just across the Iranian border in southwestern Afghanistan.

She's been in the camp for two months. She lives in utter destitution in a canvas tent, like thousands of others who fled after air strikes wiped out entire towns.

"We want to go home but what is home now?" she asked.

"Whenever the country is ready, we will hopefully go home."

For now, Gholam Sayfoor is also reluctant to return to a home near Herat from which he ran with his wife, Molki, more than two months ago.

"The Taliban burned our wheat and our farmland. They burned our dogs by putting petrol on them," said Sayfoor.
"Now our land has been destroyed again by bombs."

David Bygroves, a volunteer with the UK Samaritan's Purse, Operation Christmas Child, entertaining the crowds at the Mile 46 Refugee Camp in S.W. Afghanistan, Tuesday.

The Iranian government has pledged to continue supporting the Afghan refugee camps. They've plowed money into building new roads.

They plan to create educational programs for the people of Afghanistan. More than 70 per cent of the country is illiterate -- 90 per cent of women can't read or write.

"The government has a plan to give education and aid to people in Afghanistan," said Seyed Mahmood Husseini, governor of the Iranian province of Baluchistan.

"We also believe that if security problems are resolved, a lot of Afghans will go back to their homes."

But what will they do upon their return?

With their familiar home landscape marred and scarred by missiles and landmines, the country's main industry of agriculture will be difficult to restore.

At least one government official fears desperate Afghans who previously farmed to survive will resort to cultivate drugs in a country already notorious for the growing and trafficking of opium, hashish and other illegal substances.

Afghanistan's Nimruz province, for example, used to be a fertile area with a large and successful agriculture industry.

That all changed, quickly.

When the Taliban came to power in 1996, they dammed the Helmand River -- which stretches from west of Kabul to Zaranj -- to use the water for massive poppy fields which produce 75 per cent of the world's opium.

Despite the Taliban's claim it would wipe out illegal drugs, government officials and locals are adamant the exact opposite was the case.

"The Taliban used to pay people to grow the poppies," said Safar Eslami, an Iranian government official.

Afghanistan is a major producer of hashish and security officials say heroin production is also on the rise.

A young Afghan refugee tried his hamonica that he recieved in his gift filled shoe box during the Operation Christmas Child distribution.

"We have 1,000 kilometres of border and it's too difficult to stop the drug traffickers. They're too strong," said Ali Rostami, the Iranian minister who oversees refugees in his country.

Rostami says dozens of Iranian soldiers and police officers have been shot after stopping cars with drug smugglers near the border.

"(The drug traffickers) know how to get (opium) across the border. Even if we go up in the air with helicopters, we can't see them."

Where basic agricultural crops used to thrive in an ideal climate, southwestern Afghanistan has now turned into a vast wasteland of abandoned farms and dried-out fields.

Adding to the catastrophic problems already being faced, the country is suffering through yet another of drought. This one is said to be the worst in the past 30 years.

More than half of Afghanistan's 34,000 villages have been destroyed by war and pestilence.
Many former wheat fields remain barren, riddled with landmines.

Known as a nation for its textiles, hand-made carpets, furniture and its vast supply of natural gas and oil, Afghanistan's 26 million people are left with the unimaginable challenge of trying to rebuild on top of what little is left after recent events.

Refugee children circling around and checking out Calgary Herald photographer Mikael Kjellstrom during a visit to the Mile 46 refugee camp.

Before the anti-Taliban and anti-terrorism war, the average working wage was a paltry $800 a year. Now, people are even poorer.

Dozens of non-governmental organizations have stepped up with aid for the people of Afghanistan including Samaritan's Purse, a humanitarian aid organization whose Canadian head office is in Calgary.

The group spent the last week bringing hygiene packages and shoe boxes filled with toys to the more than 10,000 Afghans living as internally displaced people in refugee camps near Zaranj.

The group intends to be part of the long, arduous task of rebuilding a country filled with refugees.

It is expected Samaritan's Purse will build a hospital in the region within the year.

It might help ease the agony of the long wait to go home, slightly.


Herald reporter Emma Poole and Herald photographer Mikael Kjellström travelled through Afghanistan as part of a humanitarian aid project with Samaritan's Purse. They covered the distribution of 3,500 gift packages packed by Calgary kids for Afghan kids.

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A People in need of a future

A People in need of a future