Hundreds of Pakistani, and Afghanis are being transported to Turkey and Europe via Iran by the human smugglers with the connivance border forces in Pakistan, Iran and Turkey. Many of them are killed whenever border forces intercepted their way due to the reason best known to them .Afghan lawmakers had said 45 migrants trying to cross into Iran were killed by Irani border guards.
Telling a tale of woes, Ahmed gives me unclear instructions. Speaking in Balochi over the phone, he tells me to reach Nok Kundi, a township in Chagai District, “in the dark”. He does not specify a time and gives me no room for follow-up questions, hanging up after speaking barely two sentences.
Thinking that he wants me to arrive while the town is asleep, I reach the given address at midnight. From the looks of it, Ahmed is asleep too. I repeatedly call his phone, but to no avail. As stray dogs take over the street outside his house, I knock and shout his name. Eventually, I decide to climb the gate and call out his name again.
He wakes up and is, expectedly, unhappy. “Is this any time to come?” Ahmed shouts, only getting angrier when he checks the time on his mobile phone. “You should have come during the day.”
I am utterly confused. I remind him that he had asked me to arrive ‘in the dark’. Apparently, those instructions were not meant to be taken so literally; he had simply meant that I should arrive discreetly. By climbing his gate after midnight and yelling his name till he woke up, I had clearly failed to fulfil that brief.
Discretion will be important while reporting this story. After all, I will be reporting on a human smuggling racket and travelling towards Iran with individuals crossing over illegally. This is an unsafe journey, only taken by those who need to flee to Iran (and often plan to eventually make their way to Turkey or Europe).
With frequent exchanges of bribes, exploitation of those desperate to get out and a complete disregard for many laws, this is not a journey that is meant to be witnessed by any journalist. And so, I will be undercover and will have to avoid bringing attention to myself in the way I did by showing up to my source Ahmed’s house and yelling his name at midnight.
I chalk this error in judgement to exhaustion — I haven’t slept in two days — and anticipation of the journey ahead. Ahmed is the only person featured in this story who knows my true identity. I sleep at his house for a few hours, before I have to be on my way.
As morning comes, I prepare to end up as an illegal immigrant in my own country.
A ‘NASWAR’S’ FICTIONAL TALE
Lately, I have been spending a lot of time on phone calls while preparing for this story. Even on the day of the journey, I find myself making another call, this time to Arbab, the head of one of the human smuggling rackets and an owner of vehicles that transport illegal immigrants.
Arbab answers the phone and gets straight to the point. “Are you a ‘naswar’ [snuff] or are you a ‘mirch’ [chilli]?” he asks, using the code words they use for Afghans and Punjabis.
“Arbab, I am a naswar,” I respond in Balochi. He then asks me to come to a parchoon ki dukaan [grocery store] at London Road, which passes Nok Kundi.
I assume this means the questioning is over. I am wrong.
I arrive at the store. I am wearing a silver coloured Baloch shalwar kameez and a white chador with black stripes. I use the chador to cover my face. At the store, I drink mineral water before calling Arbab.
He is looking at me from another shop and recognises me, even though I have covered my face. “Yes. I can see you holding a mobile to your ear with a white chador,” he says and waves me over. While feeling nervous, I head to the other shop.
At the shop, Arbab is sitting on a chair while I sit on the floor. “So, how can an Afghan speak in Balochi?” he asks.
I feel nervous over the question, but fight not to let it show. I have prepared for this and have gone over my carefully crafted backstory many times.
“I am an Afghan from Quetta, but my mother is a Barech from Gharibabad Killi in Nushki District,” I say. Barech Pashtuns are a minority in this belt. Many of them are married in Baloch families and predominantly speak Balochi.
“So, what is your subtribe in Barech?” Arbab fires back.
Although the prepared answer, Akazai Barech, is in my head, I cannot bring it to my tongue due to my nerves. Instead, I tell him I moved to Quetta from Nushki during my childhood, and do not know what my mother’s subtribe is.
Before he asks a third question, I gain a little confidence and share with him the ordeal of joblessness in Quetta. “Arbab, do you know,” I ask him, “...men in their late forties are unmarried in Quetta due to joblessness and a lack of even menial work? They live their lives as bachelors, despite having degrees in their hands.”
Arbab looks surprised. His eyes dilate, and he takes his tongue out slightly and holds it between his teeth. “Really?” he asks, giving me room to elaborate.
Feeling more in control of the conversation, I continue. “As an Afghan, I could only matriculate,” I say, still sitting on the floor in front of him, as if he were a king on a throne and I his subject. “Unlike other bachelor men my age, I am engaged to an Afghan girl in Quetta.”
As Arbab intently listens to the tales I am spinning, one of his men serves us tea.
Arbab is now convinced to the extent of being generous. “There is no need for you to leave Pakistan,” he says. “Why not?” I ask, taking a sip of my tea. “I can hire you in a garage here in Nok Kundi.”
“No Arbab!” I respond immediately. “My father-in-law has given me four months to pay the dowry,” I say. “If I do not earn the money, which is a sizable sum, he will break my engagement with my fiancé.”
Eventually, Arbab acquiesces. In order to avoid more questions, I ask him to point me in the direction of a washroom. He directs me to the washroom of a nearby mosque on the same road. I idly sit inside for over five minutes, until Arbab comes and knocks on the door. He asks me to hurry up, the vehicle has arrived.
Before leaving I kiss Arbab’s hand, then bring it towards my eyes and chest, as a sign of reverence.
I then see the pick-up truck we will be travelling towards Iran in.
Fittingly, it is manufactured by Zamyad Co. in Tehran, and locally referred to as ‘Zambad’.
The only people to get on the Zambad are me, the driver Dost Muhammad, and a kaleinder (cleaner). This is the stop from where the vehicles leave, the passengers will join in at the next stop.
I use the drive to the next stop to try and befriend the driver who is also a local Baloch. The benefit of being the first passenger on the truck is that I get a seat. The Zambad only has space for four passengers in the front, all the others will have to squeeze in the back.
THE LONELY DESERT
Situated at the edge of Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan is the desert of Duk. In some places, the sand dunes are as high as the rugged mountains that can be seen in several parts of Balochistan. Speaking about the region’s unique landscape, American geologists reportedly once said that this was “the closest thing to Mars on earth.”
When we get to Duk, the other travellers have already arrived. Hundreds of Afghan immigrants, including women and children, illegally arrive in Duk from all parts of Afghanistan. As per one smuggler’s estimate, over 35 thousand arrive in a month.
If one wants to witness the real cost of Afghanistan’s 40 years of war, one should visit this place. The people’s long faces are clearly pale and exhausted, and tell the story of a war-torn Afghanistan.
As this area sees so much foot traffic of travellers, a tiny pop-up bazaar has opened up in the desert. Bottled water (smuggled from Iran), biscuits and juices are sold in tents. Everything here is pricier. If a bottle of water costs 50 rupees in Quetta or Karachi, it costs 100 rupees here. Despite this, one by one, the Afghan travellers buy water and other items of necessity. The sun is already out and people want to beat the heat. Fortunately, the water is chilled and provides momentary relief.
With a group of two dozen Afghan immigrants, most of them Uzbeks and Tajiks, the real journey begins from Duk. “Mandhana Bashey [greeting in Dari],” I warmly say to everyone on the Zambad. But the sleepy environment on the pick-up is no place for greetings. Nobody responds.
More than 20 passengers squeeze in the back of the Zambad, the rest of us are in the front seats.
Our driver, Dost Muhammad, turns the ignition on, presses the clutch and puts the car in first gear, slowly pressing the accelerator. The pick-up starts wobbling through the sandy routes. Ours is not the only Zambad taking this journey; instead we are a tiny caravan of four pick-up trucks.
As we make our way through the desert terrain, our Zambad gets stuck in the sand. We all get off to push it out. Before I’ve even had the chance to put my hands on the Zambad, some Uzbek men and boys lift the vehicle out of the sand. Soon enough, we are back inside, wobbling along with the Zambad.
The breathtaking drive through the desert takes about 30 minutes. I see, firsthand, just how powerful Zambads are. “It is a poor person’s Land Cruiser,” Dost Muhammad later tells me. A new Land Cruiser can cost up to 53 million rupees, while the Zambad we are on is worth a mere two lakh rupees.
After our Zambad is out of the desert area, we enter a somewhat dark brown landscape after around 35 minutes; the landscape continues to change colours as we drive ahead. The three pick-ups follow us and, sometimes, overtake us.We are on a kutcha (makeshift) road, but Dost Muhammad is in no mood to drive slowly anymore. The road may be patchy, but it is a definite upgrade from the desert sand. As Dost Muhammad cruises, the speedometer’s hand touches 120km/h. Those of us with seats attempt to hold on to them, while those in the back quietly withstand the bumpy ride. Being illegal immigrants, nobody can complain.
I recite my kalmas over and over again, and attempt to recall the safar ki dua (prayer for travelling), which is escaping me.
Eventually, Dost Muhammad slows down a bit. Everyone is wide awake by now. Taking advantage of this, I greet my seatmate named Izzat. “Mandhana Bashey,” I say. “Khair Bashey,” he responds.
I have recently started learning Dari, and am very happy that he understood me. With newfound (most likely undeserved) confidence in my Dari-speaking skills, I decide to ask him where in Afghanistan he is from, and why he is fleeing the country. First I formulate the questions in my mind. And it takes me another minute to say them to Izzat, who is still listening to me attentively. After finishing my questions, I ask him: “Fahmidi? [Understood?].” “Na fahmidi [not understood],” he responds.
I keep at it and, eventually, the conversation starts to flow. Izzat tells me that he is from Afghanistan’s Farkar District. “It is a piece of heaven on earth,” he says. “But what it does not have is peace. We have left it behind in search of a better life.”
Izzat does not want the next generation to grow up like he and those before him did. He intends to go to Turkey and support his family financially from there. Eventually, he hopes, he will be able to call his family to Turkey too.
But it will not all be smooth sailing. There are many dangers on the way and, indeed, the route can be deadly. Last year, Afghan lawmakers had said 45 migrants trying to cross into Iran were killed by Irani border guards.
Izzat is all too aware of these realities. But the slight chance that he’ll be able to make it through and start a better life is enough for him to take the risk.
My conversation with Izzat is interrupted because the Zambad is back at the same speed, jumping up and down on the kutcha road. Soon, we cross London Road that lies between Nok Kundi (where my journey started) and Taftan. The pick-up’s speed remains the same.
While driving like a mad man, Dost Muhammad is also trying to call Arbab; distracted because he is not getting cell service. Fearing for my life, I politely ask him if I should try to make the call instead. But my frequent attempts at calling Arbab are also useless. There is no network coverage.
As I continue to try calling Arbab, I am distracted by a ruckus in the back. Two Uzbek passengers start to hit each other and violently fight. As they continue, our driver remains unmoved. “These Uzbeks’ anger starts where a Pashtun’s anger ends,” he declares.
Being confined in a small space during the bumpy ride is clearly getting to people. Following a four-hour-long drive in the Zambad, we stop at a hotel in an area called Siahpat (black plain). There is no human settlement in sight. This is a route only used by smugglers.
The border force Frontier Corps (FC) apparently keeps a close eye on this ‘no man’s land’. The smugglers and the smuggled alike fear the FC men.
