Translated material
Blave for execution
Citizens of Afghanistan, who came to Russia for the European Football Championship and asked for asylum, can be expelled from the country - to certain death.
On July 21 and 23, 2021, the October Court of St. Petersburg issued six decisions on the illegal finding in Russia of six citizens of Afghanistan, the United press service of the courts of St. Petersburg reports. All of them arrived in Russia with the aim of “sports ties”, having issued a fan passport. After the end of the European Football Championship on July 12, 2021, they were obliged to leave the country, but did not do it. Now five of them are facing a deportation. Why a return to their homeland for fans is equated with death, the 27-year-old Zhavad Musavi, one of the “defacers”, told the “new”.
“For me, a trip to the championship was a fulfillment of several desires at once,” says Javad. - I am rooting for the Swedish national team, and she played in St. Petersburg. I managed to visit the Gazprom Arena stadium on June 23, when the Swedes played with the Poles. Emotions cannot be conveyed in words. To see the players live, to attend one of the best stadiums in the world, to feel part of a huge sport ... I just have no words ... Another dream that has come true is to visit St. Petersburg, take a walk in famous parks, visit Peterhof and Pushkin.
Zhavad said that his wife’s brother has been living in St. Petersburg for a long time. Arriving in Afghanistan, he talked a lot about the city. The walls of the house where Zhavad lived with his family are hung with photographs with views of St. Petersburg.
“ After graduating from college in Kabul, I entered the police in 2017,” said Zhavad Musavi. - I myself come from the province of Hilmen, it borders with Pakistan, this territory has always been troubled. At first he served there, then in Kandahar. Recently in Herat - in the north of Afghanistan, there is more calmer there. In the spring of 2021, a skirmish with drug couriers was wounded and received a vacation for rehabilitation in the summer. And then just the European Championship, so I decided to go. He was not going to stay in Russia. I have a wife and four children in Afghanistan. But a week after my arrival in Russia, my wife called ...
The Herat province was not considered a stronghold of the Taliban ( an organization recognized in Russia with terrorist ). The Taliban were strong in the southern and southeastern regions of the country. While in Afghanistan there were troops of the UN countries, the Taliban in the northern regions did not feel very confident. In May 2021, the Americans (their contingent was the most numerous) announced the withdrawal of troops from the country, and the Taliban intensified their activities.
- They called me on June 29 and 30. First, the wife, then other relatives, told what was happening in Herat, ”says Zhavad. - When he left, everything was calm there, but everything changed in a matter of days. The Taliban seized power in the north, all the police, who did not have time to escape, were shot. I was told that it is impossible to return in any case.
Taliban kill those who served in the police or army of Afghanistan. They consider us blood enemies.
A collection of armed groups speaking in support of the Ministry of Defense of Afghanistan against Taliban, in Kabul on June 23, 2021 Photo: AP Photo/Rahmat Gul
“This was not the case in the news, but literally the other day about 200 people killed the Taliban in Kandahar,” says Nabi Bakhtiyar, chairman of the board of the Afghan diaspora in St. Petersburg. - Only because the member of their family clan was the head of the province and was the opponent of the Taliban. Glory to Allah that their revenge does not apply to women and children. But men and adolescents do not spare.
Nabi Bakhtiyar himself fled from Afghanistan in 2000, when the Taliban attempted to seize Afghanistan and the structure on its territory of the Kingdom according to the laws of Sharia. He was then 14 years old, but Nabi's father, who held a high post in the army of Afghanistan, was afraid for his son’s life and sent him from the country. The boy was able to get to relatives in St. Petersburg and get a temporary shelter, and then Russian citizenship. Having experienced all the problems with the paperwork, Nabi is surprised at the ease of his compatriots. He says that in the 2000s the attitude to refugees from Afghanistan was completely different. And then law enforcement agencies seemed to specially delayed the design of petitions about a temporary shelter. And the court was forced to decide on deportation.
According to Zhavad, to the department for working with compatriots, refugees and immigrants of the UVM of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia for St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region, he came for the first time on July 5. That is, a week before the end of the championship. Relatives called from Afghanistan and begged not to return, but he did not accept the application for a temporary asylum.
“I went there almost every day,” says Zhavad. - It was not enough copies of documents, then guarantee, or certificates that my Devon was registered in St. Petersburg, then there is no translator. Then it turned out that I was not alone - several more fans from Afghanistan were asking for asylum. They said that they would come together on July 20. We came, and there the police with handcuffs were waiting for us. We were taken to the police department, the next day we were taken to court. I was lucky, my petition was registered. Fined, but without expulsion. And the other guys were taken directly from the court to the Red Selo.
In the Red Selo there is a temporary detention center of foreign citizens No. 1 of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia in St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region. Currently, citizens of Afghanistan, who were sentenced by the Oktyabrsky Court sentenced the October Court to expulsion. In addition to four fellow countrymen Zhavada, on July 23, another Afghan was sent to the center, who also arrived in Russia on the passport of the fan and asked for asylum.
“ The current situation is amazing for us,” said Nabi Bakhtiyar. - How did it happen that they all came together, five guys with petitions, and registered only one? The rest were awarded to expulsion.
But this means sending the guys to certain death! All of them "Taliban" already sentenced to death in absentia. One of them, Nurallah Nasrati, has just turned 20 years old ...
According to Nabi Bakhtiyar, about 100 citizens of Afghanistan arrived at Euro 2020 in St. Petersburg. Most returned to their homeland. They remained in Russia or in Europe (where they got thanks to the passport of the fan) only those who now cannot be returned to Afghanistan.
“Nurallah Nasrati’s father works in the presidential administration,” says Nabi Bakhtiyar. - Abas Ali Ahmad served in the army and fought with the Taliban. Shayst's father Khan Safiullah served in the Safety Service of Afghanistan. Such Taliban kill up to the seventh knee. Ariana Masuda and Faramanda Ahmad have similar stories. I want to pay attention to the fact that those who did not threaten death returned home. And only a real danger to life forced these six to violate the laws of Russia and stay. .
Sollpost of the Afghan Police in Herat Province, July 30, 2021 Photo: Hoshang Hashimi / AFP
According to Nabi Bakhtiyar, in Russia Afghanistan citizens have always been very loyal. In St. Petersburg, about 2 thousand now live, only 50 people do not have Russian citizenship, but they are preparing to get it.
“We respect Russia and its laws,” says Nabi Bakhtiyar. - In my memory since 2000, the Afghan diaspora only once fell into criminal reports when our compatriot Abdul Hamid was killed.
We understand that Russia was not obliged to accept us, but did it, and we will never let us down its trust, we will not violate either official laws or the laws of hospitality.
In the decisions of the October Court, the same arguments are given in the support of expulsion: the lack of evidence that one or another citizen of Russia of Afghan origin, living in St. Petersburg, is a relative of the “defector”. And the fact that “the petition for the provision of asylum is not wealthy, since the application does not indicate which body it is addressed to, and it also does not have any notes on the adoption of the petition for consideration by the territorial body of the federal executive body in the field of internal affairs in the manner prescribed by law”.
“In order to confirm the presence of relatives living in St. Petersburg, the guys had to bring a whole pile of papers from the house,” says the head of the Afghan diaspora. “But they were not driving to ask for refuge, but for a football holiday and relatives.” Then they were going to return. Are there their fault that during their departure the situation in Afghanistan has radically changed and the return of death for them is like it? Our diaspora is ready to vouch for everyone that they will not deliver any problems of Russia. These are not only words, it is ready to sign any member of our diaspora.
Now the lawyers of those sentenced to expulsion are preparing appeals to the City Court of St. Petersburg. They hope that the collected documents will be enough for the judges to show humanism and cancel the decisions on expulsion to death.