Iran deploying Afghan Refugees to Fight in Syria

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) has recruited thousands of undocumented Afghans to fight in Syria since at least November 2013, Human Rights Watch (HRW) announced on Friday.

A number of Afghans during the interviews have said to the HRW that Iranian authorities have coerced them to join the fight in favor of Assad and offered financial incentives and legal residence in Iran to encourage them to join pro-Syrian government militias, but Iranian officially claims that Afghans have volunteered to fight in Syria.

 “Iran has not just offered Afghan refugees and migrants incentives to fight in Syria, but several said they were threatened with deportation back to Afghanistan unless they did,” said Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director at Human Rights Watch. “Faced with this bleak choice, some of these Afghan men and boys fled Iran for Europe.”

Iran hosts an estimated 3 million Afghans, many of whom have fled persecution and repeated bouts of armed conflict in Afghanistan. Only 950,000 have formal legal status in Iran as refugees. The Iranian government has excluded the remainder from accessing asylum procedures, leaving many who may want to seek asylum undocumented or dependent on temporary visas.