KABUL (SW) – After three years of crippling labor in Iran, Ferouz returned to his motherland Afghanistan that he had left to escape unemployment, insecurity and poverty.
Firouz is currently working in the Pul-e-Khumri city as laborer on the project of migrants’ town in Baghlan province. He told Salam Watandar that he is now living a better life and his financial situation has improved. He called on the government to provide more job opportunities for returning migrants.
Like him, Maryam is one of the former female migrants who returned to Afghanistan after spending years in neighboring Pakistan. She said hardships compelled her to migrate in the first place, but no place is like home, and that is why she returned.
She lives happily now with her family in the Pul-e-Khumri city. She too wants the government to help the returning migrants.
Sharifullah Shafaq, head of the refugee and returnees affairs in Baghlan province, said they have undertaken several construction projects to create a workplace to solve the problems of returning families. These projects include the construction of a 2 meter long citation wall in the town of migrants, drilling 2 wells, a livestock project for 100 families, building a water canal in the central Baghlan district, building 70 houses, installing two drinking water storage bases inside Pul-e-Khumri city.
According to Shafaq, more than a thousand returning families have benefited from the assistance so far, and more than a thousand others have been provided work opportunities.
Official figures suggest, from 2016 to 2019, some 11,000 families with at least 50,000 people, have returned to Baghlan from Iran and Pakistan
ENDS