What happened to the convicted criminals that Germany deported to Afghanistan? The Taliban have now confirmed that they have released deportees – it is unclear how many. A BBC reporter was able to speak to some of them.
Ahmad (name changed) is 46 years old and says he has lived in Germany for 27 years. He was sentenced to six years in prison for a crime there, and has served five of them, he tells a BBC team in Pashto. The fact that he was to be deported to his home country of Afghanistan was a surprise to him:
“I didn’t know anything about the deportation. When we were at the airport, I was only allowed to speak to my wife briefly on the phone. It was about 2 a.m.”
We are in contact with the BBC journalist, who met and interviewed the deporteesHe is still in Kabul and does not want to give interviews for security reasons. According to him, the Taliban took the deportees to a building near the airport in Kabul after they landed.
The men were initially held there – to establish their identities, it was said, and then they were to be handed over to family members or relatives. According to the BBC reporter, there was no intention to take the men into custody.
Taliban spokesman: deportees are free
According to information from the ARD Studios New Delhi They have since been released. Taliban spokesman Suhail Shahin said the families had previously been forced to sign a declaration that the men would not commit any further crimes. He did not know whether all 28 were actually released, said Shahin.
The BBC team also spoke to Shirn (name changed from reaction). The man claims to have lived in Germany since 1995 and to have spent a total of 13 years in prison after four convictions. He also claims to have a family – wife and daughter – in Germany. He told the BBC that he did not know what to do in Afghanistan.
No clear strategy
It is the first time that Germany has deported people to Afghanistan since the Taliban seized power in 2021. 28 men were brought from Leipzig to Kabul on a charter plane. According to a government spokesman, all of them are convicted criminals, some of them are said to be classified as dangerous.
The men are between 20 and 60 years old, and many of them have spent between two and 13 years in German prisons. According to the BBC, they ended up in Kabul in handcuffs and leg irons.
The Taliban do not seem to have a clear strategy for dealing with the deportees, which is why they were initially housed in a building near the airport.
“There are no mechanisms”
Ghafoor Rafaie agrees. Between 2013 and 2021, he headed an NGO in Afghanistan that aimed to make it easier for Afghans deported from European countries to reintegrate into Afghan society. Among other things, the organization ran safe houses in Kabul, where some deportees were temporarily housed until they were able to start a new life in Afghanistan on their own.
Today, the 38-year-old lives in Germany and says: “I can well imagine that the Taliban currently do not know exactly how to deal with this situation. This is the first time in three years that Afghans have been deported from an EU country. There are mechanisms in place, but so far they only apply to those deported from countries such as Turkey. However, it is a completely different situation when people are deported from European countries.”
Hardly any information
Official Taliban sources have not yet commented on who negotiated the deportation on August 30 with them. According to media reports, the Gulf emirate of Qatar mediated between the German government and the rulers in Afghanistan. The Taliban are keeping quiet about this. Spokesman Shahin confirmed to the ARD Studio New Delhi only that Germany did not negotiate directly.
He therefore indirectly called on the German government to cooperate with the Taliban, as there are currently no clear regulations for such deportations. Such mechanisms must therefore now be developed, said Schahin.
Ahmad, who is one of the 28 deportees, tells the BBC team that he no longer has any close relatives in Afghanistan. Most of his family members live in Europe or the USA. He sees no future for himself in Afghanistan. He therefore wants to try to get back to his family somehow.
With information from Peter Hornung, ARD Studio New Delhi.