KABUL (PAN): Over the past three months, Iran has expelled nearly 1,000 illegal Afghan immigrants who entered the neighbouring country in search of jobs, the minister of refugees told the upper house on Sunday.
Jamahir Anwari explained those deported had homes in Afghanistan and they had travelled to Iran through smuggling routes.
His explanation comes days after officials in western Herat province said Iran had deported about 1,500 Afghan children in the past two months to force their parents into leaving the country.
Anwari said Iran had started ousting Afghan children a year ago, a process still ongoing. However, he pointed out that families of the deportees were not in Iran; they were in Afghanistan.
“The children are not those whose families live in Iran. Their parents are in Afghanistan and they were arrested before being deported by Iranian police,” the minister continued.
Also summoned by the Meshrano Jirga, Deputy Foreign Minister Ershad Ahmadi said the Afghan embassy in Tehran was told by Iranian authorities that the Afghan children had not been forcibly expelled.
Ahmadi said the foreign ministry had launched an investigation into the matter and results would be shared with the media. Those expelled from Iran were aged between 14 and 18 years, he added.
Ahmadi said Afghanistan and Iran had reached agreements on cooperation on judicial affairs and an exchange of prisoners, but Tehran was yet to implement the accords.
However, he acknowledged Iran had completed the dossiers of 200 Afghan prisoners who would be handed over to Kabul in near future to serve their remaining jail terms in their home country.
He said 783 Afghan prisoners were released from Iranian jails last year, when the execution of another 50 Afghans on death row was converted into life time imprisonment -- thanks to efforts by the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
