Save the Children: 80,000 Afghan children deported from Iran in June 2025

KABUL (TOLOBews): The Save the Children organization has reported that about 80,000 Afghan children were deported from Iran in June of 2025.

The organization stated that among these children, around 6,700 were unaccompanied, and nearly 39% of those who entered Afghanistan were forcibly returned.

Some deported Afghans have complained about unjust treatment and extortion by Iranian police forces. According to them, they were forced to leave the country without prior notice, carrying only the clothes they were wearing and none of their belongings. They have called on the interim government to address their challenges.

“At the camp, I paid fifteen million (Iranian tomans) for six children. For one of my sons, they took one million and 500 thousand Iranian tomans from me,” said Nooruddin, one of the deportees.

“They deported us and brought us to a camp in Zahedan. During the three days we were there, they harassed us a lot. They took two million and 200 thousand tomans from us. Now we have no money to travel to our province, Takhar,” said Abdul Basir, another deportee.

Tahir, 14, and his friend Erfan, who were born in Shiraz, Iran, spoke of the hardships of migration, the difficult living conditions, and the bitter experience of deportation and mistreatment by Iranian police.

“They gave us an exit paper valid until the 15th of the fourth month, but they deported us before the specified time and told us to leave. My father was a farmworker,” said Tahir, a deported child from Iran.

However, the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs reported that it is addressing the challenges faced by the deported children.

Samiullah Ebrahimi, spokesperson for the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, said: “We have handled more than 40,000 cases related to children, most of which involve children deported from other countries. These children were protected until their families were found and they were handed over to them.”

Meanwhile, Alireza Bikdeli, acting Ambassador of Iran in Kabul, while referring to Israeli attacks, raised concerns about increasing threats to the lives of millions of Afghans in Iran and emphasized the inseparable ties between Iran and Afghanistan.

Bikdeli said: “The attacks by the Zionist regime have endangered not only the Iranian people but also the lives of more than 6 million Afghan nationals in Iran. The bond between Iran and Afghanistan is unbreakable.”

While the unprecedented increase in deportations of Afghan migrants from Iran and the mistreatment they face has sparked much criticism, the acting ambassador of Iran in Kabul appears to justify this situation by linking it to Israeli attacks on Iran and the security of migrants’ lives.