Examination of Witnesses (Questions 589
- 599)
TUESDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2003
MR MOHAMMAD
FAHIM AKBARI,
MR ZEMMARAI
SHOHABI AND
MR HASHMATULLAH
ZARABI
Q589 Chairman: Good morning, gentlemen,
thank you very much for coming as witnesses to the Select Committee
this morning as part of a series of hearings which the Select
Committee has been holding on asylum issues. I understand that
you all have refugee status and work for Migrant Helpline but
I should like to ask you to introduce yourselves briefly and then
we shall start the questioning session.
Mr Zarabi: Hashmatullah Zarabi.
I am from Afghanistan. I have been here in this country for about
two years. I have refugee status.
Mr Akbari: My name is Mohammad
Fahim Akbari and I have been in the UK for the last two years.
I have been granted indefinite exceptional leave to remain in
the UK.
Mr Shohabi: My name is Zemmarai
Shohabi. I am from Afghanistan and I have been in the UK since
April 2001. I have been granted exceptional leave to remain in
the UK.
Q590 Chairman: Could you start by
telling the Committee about the experiences which led you to leave
Afghanistan?
Mr Akbari: Back home I was persecuted
by the Taliban. I used to be an English teacher and I taught people
there. They suspected that I was spreading Christianity, they
accused me of being a Christian and that was why I was detained
and they attacked our English centre. My cousin and I were taken
into a detention centre and there we were detained for some time,
approximately two weeks. During detention we were tortured mentally
and physically. You had better know that some elements of the
Taliban take bribes, so to save our lives our family arranged
for a security guard to secure our release and we managed to escape.
As there was no safe place left for us to remain in Afghanistan,
we decided to leave for a safe place and we arranged with an agent.
The agent then took control of our journey. We embarked upon a
very perilous journey because when an asylum seeker leaves he
has to go illegally through some countries and when he enters
them it is life-threatening and sometimes once you enter some
western European countries they are a little bit safer. Apart
from these perils, on the way you have to go hungry, you are detained
in places where you have to go hungry for several days and you
are put in the back of lorries which are locked up and then you
are handed over to the Mafia. If you ask people where your destination
is and where you will enter, they do not answer. They say if we
ask it will jeopardise our status and our life. So you do not
know. You go until you end up in a place and then you claim asylum.
Q591 Chairman: We will come back
to details of the journey and how you came to be in certain countries
in just a moment. I wonder whether the other two witnesses would
describe their own experiences in Afghanistan.
Mr Zarabi: I was studying in Afghanistan
at the university and I was a representative of an independent
organisation, a student union. As soon as the Taliban took power
in Afghanistan they just started arresting all the members of
this organisation as being against the Taliban, being non-Muslims
and being supporters of the Mujhadeen. I left home for a few days
and went into hiding somewhere, but as soon they realised where
I was, I was captured, arrested and I was detained for two months.
At times obviously I was tortured and I managed after two months
by bribing and other ways and finally I was not released, but
it was a sort of release. After one week's release I left Kabul
for Mazar-e-Sharif, the city was under the control of General
Dostan, one of their opponents. I worked in Mazar-e-Sharif under
the control of General Dostan for two years and when the Taliban
took power and came to Mazar-e-Sharif I had to leave there and
came to the northern area and a district near to Kabul, which
is ruled by the opposition. I was there for one year and in 1999
the Taliban took power there as well and I had to leave the district
with a huge number of migrants and I went to Pakistan. I could
not stay there for long because the Taliban influence was more
in some parts of Pakistan than in some parts of Afghanistan. I
managed, with the help of some friends in western countries, to
leave Pakistan and finally came here.
Q592 Chairman: Thank you very much
indeed. Zamma.
Mr Shohabi: My story is a little
bit longer because my family and myself were supporters of the
PDPA, the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan. In 1982 for
the first time, because my father was a general officer working
with Dr Najibullah, the former President of Afghanistan during
the Communist regime, my family and our home were attacked by
the Mujhadeen and we had to leave our family home town where the
family was born to the south of Kabul and go into the city centre
because there we could be safe. Until 1992 when the Islamic Revolution
happened we lived in Kabul and my father was detained for two
days by the Mujhadeen and they came to my home and attacked my
family and they launched rockets and my mother and my sister were
injured. My sister had a very bad cut on her left arm and my mother
was injured in the stomach. I took them to hospital and after
two or three days they came to arrest me. I had no choice so I
left my family and went into hiding. After 40 days they took my
father from somewhere south of Kabul and they took him to the
city centre to execute him. My father worked for the army in Afghanistan
for 42 years, he was very old and very honest with people and
with the country and one of his officers recognised my father
and said "You trained me as an officer, but I joined the
Mujhadeen and right now it is my turn to help you". He helped
my father to escape. My father escaped and went into hiding and
after two months the whole family together had to leave until
my mother and sister recovered and were a little better. We went
from Afghanistan to Pakistan and there my father was again followed
by the Mujhadeen because the source of the Mujhadeen was in Pakistan.
Three friends of my father who were also general officers were
held and another friend of my father advised my father to go and
hide somewhere. We were in hiding for eight months, my father
was in hiding, and after that we moved from town to town and city
to city, village to village and we survived until 1994. In 1994
we had no choice because the Islamic Party of the Mujhadeen was
completely against the Pajam Party and they were looking for my
father because my father studied anti-tank missiles for nine years
in Russia and he knew how to adjust the rockets to be used against
aircraft. They were looking for my father and for four years they
could not find him and after that my father said we could not
stay in Pakistan but we had to move back to Afghanistan because
the police in Pakistan always helped these parties. We moved back
to the north of Afghanistan and Mazar-e-Sharif because there was
a party which worked with the Mujhadeen but they were not involved
in the Mujhadeen, General Dostan. After that the general wanted
to use my father and said he had to adjust the rockets for use
against the Mujhadeen and other parties. My father was not ready
to do this because it was against human beings, against the Afghan
people. They did not want to use it in the war and my father would
not accept that, so we moved back to Kabul. After we arrived in
Kabul after one and a half years the Taliban occupied Kabul. At
the beginning, my father, my two brothers and I were hiding for
two or three days and after three days my elder brother, who was
a colonel, came home to ask my family how they were and the Taliban
reported that he was at home and they came and killed my elder
brother, 27 years old, in front of my mother and my family. Once
again we had to leave Afghanistan and we went back to Pakistan
and we stayed there until 1999. In 1999 the Taliban came to my
home in Pakistan, arrested my father and took him back to Afghanistan.
They said they would give him a job and they did not want to persecute
him. When they came and took my father back to Afghanistan and
Kabul, we had to move because we had no chance, we were hiding
with a member of our family but as our father had gone we decided
to move back. We went back to Kabul and after that day we managed
to bribe some people to release my father. They released my father
and he escaped again, to Islamabad this time. They put me in prison
for eight months and they tortured me in Kabul with electric shocks,
everything; I have the scars on my back and I had no choice because
they wanted to kill me as they had killed my brother and I left
Afghanistan.
Q593 Chairman: Thank you very much
indeed all of you for giving us that background. We obviously
have a problem as we have a limited amount of time. If what you
are saying would simply be the same as your colleague, then please
leave it at that. If you have had a different experience or have
a different point of view, then we should like to hear it. One
further question from me. When you left Afghanistan, or when you
left Pakistan, was it your intention specifically to come to the
United Kingdom or were you simply seeking any country in which
you might be able to apply for asylum?
Mr Zarabi: No. The only thing
we could think about was saving our lives. To be honest, I did
not know about the UK. I did not know a lot about this country.
The only thing which made me come here was, as my friend Mr Akbari
mentioned, sometimes we had no choice, we could not choose the
place where we were going. The only thing, I have to emphasise
and I repeat, was to save our lives and that was it.
Q594 Chairman: Is that the same for
all of you?
Mr Akbari: Yes; exactly the same.
Q595 Mr Prosser: Mr Akbari and Mr
Zarabi, you both made the point that you did not really know what
your final destination would be, but you handed over large amounts
of money to an agent.
Mr Akbari: Exactly.
Q596 Mr Prosser: Taking into account
that that is a huge commitment on your side, what is in it for
the trafficker? Why does the trafficker or the Mafia or the gangster
bother to take you through so many so-called safe countries, right
across Europe and then take extra risks in terms of his own position
and extra risks in terms of you not successfully gaining access
by crossing the Channel into the United Kingdom which, because
of its island status and because of recent events, is probably
one of the most reinforced and secure borders there is? What is
in it for the gangster if the money is already paid and the contract
set?
Mr Akbari: I should like to answer
this question. As I mentioned earlier, the destination hinges
upon the decision of the agent and there is a rule that when the
agent takes you, the further he takes you the more money he makes.
So usually he is looking for a place further away. For example,
if he takes you to Germany, he would not earn as much money as
he could for taking you to the UK. That is why he is reluctant
to do so. For example, if I pay 8,000 the agent will take me to
Germany and he says that you cannot go to Germany and he argues
and you cannot get him to accept because he makes more money taking
people to the UK; if he passes through any country, the amount
of money increases. That is why the agents have boundless avidity
for taking you to places further away.
Q597 Mr Prosser: I can understand
that, but if that sort of discussion takes place, if that negotiation
takes place "Don't go to Germany because that is dangerous.
Don't go to Holland because you might not get asylum. Go to Britain
because you have better chance of asylum", then surely that
is a negotiation you have influence on?
Mr Akbari: No, when you talk to
them they say they would like to take you to a place where they
are able to arrange it and they have resources and there is no
danger. We ask really for any safe country because if your life
is greatly at risk, you would go anywhere. I remember that because
of persecution in a country we were left in a locked apartment.
I said I did not want to leave because each time we were passing
through the jungle and my feet were swelling and I said I wanted
to stay and I did not want to die. My skin was itchy and there
was no medication, nothing. They said I could not because they
money was held by a third party and until you arrive at the destination
the money is not released, so they take you to that place.
Q598 Mr Prosser: Almost by definition
in what you have said, is the final destination not tied directly
to the amount of money and therefore you are exercising a choice
in your final destination?
Mr Akbari: No, they do not tell
you like they trust you "You have a choice of Germany and
these countries". At first they tell you that you have to
give 10,000 and they are interested in bringing people to this
country because they make more money.
Mr Prosser: I do not quite understand
that.
Q599 David Winnick: Noting the answers
which you have just given, there is no dispute for most people
in this country—virtually everyone—that the Taliban
regime was absolutely vile and murderous; that is not in dispute.
Mr Zarabi, you escaped from Afghanistan to Pakistan. You say that
you have many friends there. The inevitable question which many
people are bound to ask is that since Pakistan is very different
from what Afghanistan was, why not stay in Pakistan?
Mr Zarabi: I mentioned that the
Pakistan Government was the only supporter of the Taliban in the
world. The Pakistan Government was the only supporter of the Taliban.
Whatever the Taliban wanted, the Pakistan Government wanted to
do for them. The Taliban's power in Pakistan was more than in
some parts of Afghanistan.
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