World Vision declares emergency response at Iran-Afghanistan border
NGO warns of “heartbreaking” child protection challenges, shelter shortages, and service gaps amid chaotic surge in returns
Thursday 3 July 2025: 00:01 (Kabul)
World Vision has launched an emergency response at Afghanistan’s Islam Qala border crossing, where tens of thousands of returnees – including distressed children – are arriving daily to overcrowded, under-resourced facilities, amid warnings of a deepening humanitarian crisis.
World Vision Afghanistan (WVA) has declared an emergency response at the Iran-Afghanistan border as the number of returnees has surged in recent days.
Overnight, 2 July, crowds of returning Afghans were caught outside a temporary reception camp at the Islam Qala border crossing, unable to find shelter due to a lack of capacity, while Iranian forces reportedly fired into the air to drive them towards the camp’s locked gates.
With Afghan officials concerned that a stampede into the camp could harm children sleeping on the floor within the facility, the gates remained locked, leaving those outside trapped between a fence and gunfire.
Since a deadline of 6 July was imposed by the Iranian authorities in March, 640,000 Afghans have returned to their homeland, 366,000 of whom have been deported. In just a matter of days, four million Afghans will therefore be deemed ‘illegal’ in Iran as their residency slips have been revoked. This has accelerated the mass return of individuals and families at Afghan borders.
At the Islam Qala border alone, 222,729 individuals returned during June, peaking at 24,333, 1 July.
Speaking from Islam Qala, says WVA National Director, Thamindri De Silva:
“Afghans are arriving at the border of their homeland in a desperate condition. It is heartbreaking to see children looking dazed, disoriented and distressed, unsure where home is or what home is. Urgent support for these families is essential, and yet agencies are trying to respond with next to no new money because of ongoing aid cuts.
“And the border crisis is only part of the story: the hardest part for many will be starting from scratch in the communities that struggled to sustain them in the first place, driving them to migrate. Without investment in basic human needs support in Afghanistan, already-inadequate services will simply collapse, multiplying humanitarian need.
“At border crossings, like Islam Qala, needs far exceed the available support currently available. Facilities can accommodate only a few hundred people per day; however, thousands are arriving daily. Shelters are overcrowded and lack basic amenities, including waste management and proper sanitation facilities.
“Returnees report the confiscation of personal items, like phones, during their deportation journey and some arrive at the border with only the clothes on their back. Many require immediate food, shelter, medical, psychosocial support, and transportation assistance to reach their home provinces.
“That’s why World Vision is responding in our backyard of Herat, contributing to the interagency effort to relieve suffering. Our helpdesk will enable people who have no other means of connecting with family or other support to do so, while our assistance with healthcare, sanitation and hygiene promotion, will help to relieve some of the distress that so many are subject to when they arrive.
“Yet, for many, the hardest part lies ahead. Afghanistan’s fragile infrastructure, climate shocks, poverty, and job scarcity, were what was driving people to Iran in the first place. In areas of West Afghanistan where World Vision is headquartered, there are communities with almost no men aged 13 or over because they are all in Iran working.
“The drivers of this labour migration remains – and how it is inevitable that such a sizeable return of people in need will stretch services to breaking point, without urgent international intervention.
“World Vision urges the international community to urgently increase funding for humanitarian response and reintegration support in Afghanistan.”
Returnees tell their own stories of anxiety and distress. Said Abdul Wahid, a man returning from Iran: “We have nothing and were forced to return. We don’t have shelter or cash and don’t know what to do. They took all our money, and we suffered mistreatment.”
Said Nasiba, a returning Afghan woman who had lived in Iran for 15 years: “I’m a tailor but I have no equipment, no place to work. Still, we want to feed ourselves and not rely on others.”
ENDS
Notes
While seasonal labour migration across the Iran-Afghanistan border has occurred for centuries, recent years have seen Iranian authorities harden their stance toward Afghan migrants. In 2023, Afghans were banned from working in 16 Iranian provinces. Afghanistan’s Ministry of Repatriations and Refugees (MORR) estimates over half a million Afghans returned in 2024, most forcibly. In May 2025, Iran revoked bargeh sarshomari (census slips) – documents that allowed limited residency and services for Afghans arriving post-2021. This reclassified many as undocumented, with a 6 July 2025 deadline set for up to 4 million Afghans to leave. Following the Iran-Israel conflict, Afghans were accused of aiding Israeli intelligence for payment, heightening anti-Afghan sentiment.
World Vision Afghanistan began its work in humanitarian and development work in 2001 and is headquartered in Herat city. It has established a helpdesk at Islam Qala to assist returnees at the border with accessing the services they urgently need, and to connect them with family members and other support where possible. World Vision is also supporting with hygiene promotion, waste management and the provision of essentials, including shade, soap, towels and black plastic garbage bags for waste collection, psychological first aid, psychosocial services and play materials for children and medical supplies to support agencies with stockouts to families in need.
Around 22.9 million people are thought to be in need of humanitarian assistance across Afghanistan, with approximately 3.5 million children facing acute malnutrition. The 40% cut in international assistance to the country this year alone, as well as the vast underfunding of the humanitarian response plan, leaves services alarmingly overstretched, which will only be further compounded by the arrival of millions of women, men, and children, many in urgent need of support. Moreover, the subsequent decline in remittances from labourers in Iran to vulnerable communities could drive a spiral of demand for a system at breaking point. Plummeting access to health care facilities is a particular concern to World Vision as, across the country, at least 409 health centres have already closed this year due to aid cuts.
IOM Returnee Data (June 2025) – Islam Qala
Spontaneous Returns
Families: 18,042
Family members: 95,277
Individuals (unaccompanied or single): 13,361
Pushback Returns
Families: 12,435
Family members: 54,421
Individuals (unaccompanied or single): 59,740
Overall Return Figures
Total families: 30,477
Total family members: 149,698
Total individuals (spontaneous + pushback): 73,101
Overall total returnees: 222,799
Contacts
Thamindri De Silva: National Director, World Vision Afghanistan, Phone: + 93 79 920 9720, e-mail-thamindride_silva@wvi.org
Mark Calder: Advocacy, Policy and Communications Director, World Vision Afghanistan, Phone: +44 7877 243509, e-mail-mark_calder@wvi.org
Ria Mohammad Rehaa: Communications Manager (Partnership), World Vision Afghanistan, +93 74 447 7251, e-mail-ria_rehaa@wvi.org