In Moscow, a large Afghan community, with no prospect of return

Audio 03:47

By: Daniel Vallot Follow

They have lived in Russia since the early 1990s and the fall of the Communist regime, which followed the departure of Soviet troops from Afghanistan. The Afghans in Moscow never imagined that 20 years later their country would still be at war and that their children would speak more easily in Pushkin's language than in Pashto or Farsi.

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"  I was living in Afghanistan, I was studying at the French language school  "

Very proud to remember a few words of French, Khafisolla welcomes us to his little shop, behind a counter loaded with multicolored necklaces. We are on the eighth floor of a former Soviet hotel transformed into a shopping center. From floor to floor, in old hotel rooms, you can find cheap clothes, plastic toys made in China, cosmetics and junk jewelry.

Most of the traders here are Afghan exiles, who fled their country in the early 1990s.

This is what Khafisolla recounts: “  I worked in a ministry and when the Mujahedin took Kabul, they attacked all those who worked for the government. Our lives were in danger, they could kill us at any time. So I came here, to Russia, and I still live there today  ”.

Afghans in Moscow very often have the same story to tell. Details change, but the frame is similar. The withdrawal of Soviet troops in 1989, then the fall of the communist regime, and the flight abroad.

Several hundred thousand of them then choose Russia as their host country, as explained by Goulam Mohammad, director of the Center for the Afghan Diaspora in Russia. “   After the fall of Mohammad Najibullah in 1991, virtually everyone who was in power, or close to power, arrived here. There were ministers, journalists, academics and their families ... And the only country that was our friend at the time was the USSR. We thought they would welcome us with open arms, but we quickly became disillusioned. In the 90s, the situation here was very complicated. There was the fall of the USSR and then the collapse of the economy… The country was not really able to take care of us.  ".

Without obtaining the refugee status that Russia refuses to give them, many Afghans leave for Europe or the United States. But several tens of thousands of them prefer to stay put.

This is the case of Rafissoulah, who has never returned to his country of origin since he fled. “  Of course, I miss my country terribly,” he says. When we got here we were hoping the situation would improve and we could go home. But the war has continued and we cannot come back! And then it's not just war, there's insecurity. There, you can get killed for nothing, for a cell phone. In Afghanistan, people live every day as if it were the last. And then here we have work, and we can live normally.  "

With a slightly sad smile, Rafissoulah recalls his three children, aged 6 to 13. All were born in Russia and have never been to Afghanistan. At home, he tells us, they speak Farsi, the language of their parents, but between them it is in Russian that they prefer to speak. “  I think my children will stay in Russia. They are used to this country, and its laws. And they have never set foot in Afghanistan. But that saddens me because Afghanistan remains our homeland. And here, even though we live well, we remain strangers.  »He laments.

It is estimated that between 80,000 and 150,000 Afghans live in Russia today. If we do not take into account the countries of the former USSR, it is the largest foreign community on Russian territory.

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