By: Zahra Mahdi, reporter for the Local Journalism Initiative
Afghan asylum seekers who managed to flee the crisis in Afghanistan after the Taliban took over complain that they are now moving from one agency to another due to a lack of coordination between them.
Asylum seekers like Gholam Hussain Mohammadi, for example, say they haven’t even been able to apply for asylum and are stuck in limbo, with Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) telling them they have to go through the United Nations High. . Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and vice versa.
Mohammadi, a 28-year-old Afghan and Shiite Hazara who escaped from Kabul with his family, said he has sent emails to the IRCC over and over again, explaining his situation in detail, but has yet to receive a response. He strongly criticizes the inconsistency between the IRCC and the UNHCR.
“According to the IRCC, we have to apply for Canadian asylum through UNHCR, while UNHCR in Pakistan does not register us as asylum seekers. All they are telling us is that we should speak directly to the Canadian Embassy in Pakistan, ”he told New Canadian Media from Islamabad, where he and his family are currently staying.
“Like thousands of displaced Afghans in Pakistan, my family and I find ourselves in a very difficult situation. House prices have gone up a lot and we can’t afford to rent one. That is why we were living in a mosque with many other displaced Afghans when we arrived in Karachi in Pakistan, ”Mohammadi said.
Despite emailing the IRCC over and over again explaining his situation in detail, Mohammadi said he has yet to receive a response. He strongly criticizes the inconsistency between the IRCC and the UNHCR.
“According to the IRCC, we have to apply for Canadian asylum through UNHCR, while UNHCR in Pakistan does not register us as asylum seekers. All they tell us is that we should speak directly to the Canadian Embassy in Pakistan, ”he says.
After being evicted by Pakistani police from the mosque, they had to reach the capital, Islamabad. According to him, given the unaffordable cost of the trip, they found a truck driver who offered to take them at a lower cost. He and his family spent the first night of their stay in Islamabad in a park.
Mohammadi says that when he went to the Canadian embassy there, he was not allowed in because “his name had to be announced to the security police from inside (to) speak to embassy staff.” So, he had to ask security personnel his questions.
“They told me to apply for asylum through UNHCR if I had not helped the Canadian government in Afghanistan,” says Mohammadi.
When he checked this with the UNHCR office in Islamabad, he was told that UNHCR does not help Afghans resettle in Canada through the special immigration programs that the IRCC had recently announced.
“They said that the only help we can offer you at this time is to issue you a permit that would protect you and your family from being expelled by the Pakistani police,” Mohammadi said.
He’s just been hired as a laborer at a bakery in Islamabad, but he’s worried it won’t last long.
“My employer warned me that if I couldn’t communicate with clients in Urdu, they would fire me. If they fire me, we won’t even have anything to eat, ”says Mohammadi.
Inconsistencies
UNHCR acknowledges that countries such as Canada and others have implemented programs to allow some Afghan nationals “to request permission to travel to those countries,” according to its website. However, “these programs are established by those countries and UNHCR does not refer people to the programs or process applications.”
Canada is resettling Afghan nationals under two programs, the second of which will resettle Afghan nationals currently outside of Afghanistan who did not necessarily work with the Canadian government. According to the IRCC announcement, the second program will relocate Afghan citizens in two ways.
First, the government-assisted refugee program in which Afghan citizens must be referred to Canada by UNHCR or another designated reference organization. And second, privately sponsored refugees, a program that allows private individuals or groups to sponsor eligible refugees abroad.
When asked to clarify this inconsistency, UNHCR responded that: “UNHCR has long resettled Afghan refugees from first countries of asylum in a variety of resettlement countries depending on individual needs and circumstances. We continue this work as a regular part of our global resettlement program. The resettlement process depends on a series of interviews, verifications and authorizations by the resettlement countries that take time, often up to several years ”.
Hopeless
Speaking about the long processing time, MahGol Jan-Ahmadi, a 36-year-old Afghan woman who went to Pakistan seven years ago and applied for asylum through UNHCR, says she has no more hope of getting a response from UNHCR after all this. weather. The single mother of three says her application for asylum to the United States was rejected about five years ago, and since then UNHCR has made no progress on her application.
Ahmadi is frustrated by the slow progress of their asylum case, as well as the uncertainty they are struggling with.
“I am the sole breadwinner for my family and UNHCR is aware of my problems. For about six years, my daughters and I have received financial support from UNHCR, for which we were grateful. But it has been almost nine months since the supports were cut. I am not literate enough to be able to find a job and I am not familiar with Urdu, ”she said.
Currently she washes clothes to meet the urgent needs of her and her daughters. At the same time, she is learning to sew with a sewing machine provided by the UNHCR office.
“At my age, it is very difficult to learn a new skill in a foreign language. So learning to sew would be a very long-term process for me, ”she said.
For his part, Mohammadi, who used to work as a mechanical engineer at the Afghan Ministry of Defense and later the Afghanistan Civil Aviation Authority, says he “has no hope for the future” except that of his brother and sister, both which they were studying before the Taliban took over.
Given the numerous cases such as Ahmadi and Mohammadi, the question is how much Canadian humanitarian programs could actually do to resettle displaced Afghans through UNHCR to improve their situation while they live outside Afghanistan in extreme security and economic conditions. ?
“No one needs more support than Afghans who have been forced to flee Afghanistan,” Mohammadi said. “Our request to the government of Canada and other Western countries is to help us out of this terrible situation by accepting us as refugees.”
Reference-ygknews.ca