Deadly Collision in Herat Province
The accident happened Tuesday night in Herat province when a bus transporting passengers who were heading to Kabul collided with a truck and a motorcycle. The impact ignited the bus, which none of the passengers were able to escape. Two others in the other vehicles also died in the crash, said Ahmadullah Mottaqi, the director of information and culture in Herat.
Police sources said all the passengers had boarded at Islam Qala, a town on the Afghan side of the border that is adjacent to Iran. The passengers were returning from Iran and were migrants, said Mohammad Yousuf Saeedi, a spokesman for the provincial governor. Herat police later said the bus driver was at fault, driving at excessive speed and in a careless manner.
Rising Deportations and Refugee Challenges
In the past few months, Iran has increased deportations to Afghanistan of undocumented Afghan migrants who had fled battle and economic desperation. Millions of Afghans have fled to Iran and Pakistan since the 1970s, with significant waves during the Soviet invasion in 1979, and again, after the Taliban's rise to power in 2021. This migration has fed increasing anti-Afghan sentiment in Iran, where refugees are often discriminated against.
Iran had previously set a July deadline for undocumented Afghans to leave voluntarily. But after waging a short war with Israel in June, Iranian officials have been summarily returning hundreds of thousands, arguing national security concerns. Detractors argue that these deportations could be tied to larger political concerns.
More than 1.5 million Afghans have left Iran since January, international agencies say, including entire families who had been living there for generations. Stretched already by cuts in aid and scarce resources, Afghanistan faces an acute challenge in absorbing the swell, experts caution. It is also grappling with another mass influx of Afghans returning from Pakistan, where authorities have been rounding up Afghan migrants en masse.
The return of such large numbers is an additional pressure at a time when Afghanistan is already facing acute humanitarian needs, said Arshad Malik, country director for Save the Children Afghanistan.
