KABUL — Sixteen years after he fled from the Taliban, Zia Ahmadi was back at the Kabul airport, waiting for the body of a cousin who tried to do the same.
Zia had done what he thought was best for his cousin, Javed Ahmadi, offering a smuggler $15,000 to shuttle him out of Afghanistan and away from insurgents. By December, Javed, 19, was halfway through an arduous 3,500-mile trip from Helmand province to Zia’s home in Sweden, running from the same Taliban that Zia escaped in 1997.
But the smuggler’s overloaded skiff capsized off the coast of Greece, and Javed’s body washed ashore with 21 others, nearly all of them Afghan refugees eager to leave their country before U.S. troops do next year. Now Zia was back in Kabul to bury his cousin.
Two decades after Afghanistan witnessed one of the 20th century’s most dramatic refugee crises, a quieter exodus is gaining momentum. Zia Ahmadi was part of the first generation of Afghan refugees. His cousin aspired to be part of the second.
Last year, at least 50,000 Afghans fled to Europe and Australia, more than twice as many as the previous year, according to the Afghan Ministry of Refugees and Repatriations. With U.S. and many other foreign visas nearly impossible to obtain, the majority of those refugees hired human smugglers. Even more left for Pakistan and Iran. One-third of the world’s refugees are Afghans, according to the United Nations.
The flight reflects a growing fear that security will worsen after NATO’s military withdrawal by the end of 2014, a date that has taken on near-apocalyptic symbolism in parts of the country. Afghan officials have launched a campaign to warn against illegal migration, distributing brochures nationwide that feature photos of capsized boats and drowning Afghans.
Foreign donors are planning to fund cricket matches and celebrity-filled television spots that convey the same message: Don’t risk your life to leave your country. Despite those efforts, Afghan officials expect the trend to grow.
“It tells you how much progress we’ve made as a nation,” said Zia Ahmadi, 42. “People are still doing whatever it takes to get out.”
‘Get out of here’
Javed found his smuggler in Quetta, Pakistan. He had been on the run for months, since insurgents attempted to kidnap him in a treacherous part of southern Afghanistan.
Javed had always been a target. His father transported food and ammunition to U.S. military bases. His family belonged to the long-oppressed Hazara ethnic minority. After the abduction attempt, Javed felt even more sure that he was a marked man.
Before leaving, though, he consulted his closest family members. They were already on edge: Within the past month, three relatives had been fatally shot.
A relative holds a photograph of Ahmadi.
“Get out of here. Otherwise you’ll be killed,” his uncle told him.
“You must leave. I will help you,” Zia said over the phone from Stockholm.
His father, Mohammed Bakher, said only, “It will be dangerous.”
Javed left in the summer of 2011. If all went well, he would soon bring his wife and baby daughter to Sweden.
The smuggler shuttled him and two dozen other Afghans to the mountainous Iranian border, which they crossed on foot before speeding toward Turkey in another smuggler’s van. Javed described his experience in detail to relatives, who recounted those conversations to a reporter after his death.
Before each leg of the journey, Javed called his father from the smuggler’s cellphone, trying to conceal his concern.
“Everything is fine,” Javed often said. “We are on our way.”
For weeks, Javed and other Afghan immigrants inched toward the Turkish frontier until they spotted border guards and retreated. When they finally crossed, Turkish police stopped their car. Days later, Javed was deported to Pakistan.
The process started over.
By the time Javed made it to Istanbul, he had been traveling for nearly a year and a half.
“He was exhausted,” Zia said.
Finally, on Dec. 14, he was at the threshold of Western Europe, in a small fishing village on the Aegean. He and 22 other refugees boarded a 30-foot wooden fishing boat far too small to hold them. The sea was rocky.
A few months earlier, about 60 refugees, including 31 children, had died on the same route when their boat capsized. A few days before that, nearly 100 Afghans died off the Indonesian coast.
The Afghan government had begun running a public service announcement on national television.
“The unending and deadly trips through mountains, jungles, rivers and deserts are not good options,” Refugee and Repatriation Minister Jamahir Anwari warned in the ads. “They only add to the difficulties of our noble people.”
Before the boat left its harbor, Javed made one more phone call to his father.
“Please pray for my safe arrival,” he said.
During the Soviet occupation of the 1980s, about 5 million Afghans left their country, most heading to Pakistan and Iran. The next urgent exodus began about a decade later, when Afghanistan descended into civil war.
By the time Zia fled Helmand, more than 7 million Afghans were in exile.
Zia was teaching English in southern Afghanistan when Taliban fighters burst through the doors. They threw ash in his eyes, beat him and called him a “nonbeliever” for holding the class. He knew he had to leave.
“I love my country, but I wasn’t going to wait to be killed for teaching English,” Zia said.
During the Soviet occupation of the 1980s, about 5 million Afghans left their country, most heading to Pakistan and Iran. The next urgent exodus began about a decade later, when Afghanistan descended into civil war.
By the time Zia fled Helmand, more than 7 million Afghans were in exile.
Zia was teaching English in southern Afghanistan when Taliban fighters burst through the doors. They threw ash in his eyes, beat him and called him a “nonbeliever” for holding the class. He knew he had to leave.
“I love my country, but I wasn’t going to wait to be killed for teaching English,” Zia said
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