ASIA PACIFIC

Iran Sent Them to Syria. Now

Afghan Fighters Are a Worry at
Home.
By MUJIB MASHAL and FATIMA FAIZINOV. 11, 2017
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Photo
 Afghan fighters in the Iranian-trained Fatemiyoun Division, on the front line near
Palmyra, Syria, in June.CreditMikhail Voskresenskiy/Sputnik, via Associated Press
YAKAWLANG, Afghanistan Iran has trained and deployed thousands of
Shiite Afghans as shock troops in Syrias sectarian war. Members of the
Afghan unit, the Fatemiyoun Division, wear a shoulder patch recounting
words of praise from Irans supreme leader as a badge of honor.

What those fighters might do when they come home is now very much on the
minds of officials who fear that Afghanistan may become the next great
sectarian battleground between Iran, as the declared guardian of Shiites, and
Saudi Arabia, long the sponsor of conservative Sunni doctrine around the
world.

This is quite dangerous: What happens to this Fatemiyoun force when the
war in Syria is over? said Rahmatullah Nabil, a former Afghan intelligence
chief. The fear is that rivalry in the region, between Iran and Saudi, will shift
to Afghanistan. And I think that clash is already shifting here.

There is reason for worry. First, theres a history: The factional divisions that
drove Afghanistans devastating civil war in the 1990s were seized on by
foreign powers who were seeking proxies. And theres a new concern: A
stark increase in attacks against Afghanistans Shiite minority, mostly by
Sunni extremists loyal to the Islamic State, is already providing Iran a pretext
to increase its meddling in the country.

The attacks have received wide coverage in the Iranian news media. And one
Fatemiyoun fighter who returned about three months ago from Syria said the
violence against Afghan Shiites was a frequent topic raised by their
commanders in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.

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The Afghan fighter had returned to his home in Yakawlang, a village in

Bamian Province where the Taliban massacred more than 300 Shiites in
2001. Every year, hundreds of residents kneel on the dirt in a hilltop cemetery
and beat their chests in mourning for their loved ones, their names listed on a
metal sign worn out by time and covered in rust.

The Guards commanders were saying that, if it comes to it, we will make
Bamian into a base for you, a base for Fatemiyoun, said the returning
fighter, who like others interviewed for this article spoke on the condition of
anonymity to avoid being singled out for attack.

There was always talk about that; the commander would say that one day
you will go defend in your own country, said another fighter, who had lived
in Iran for 20 years as a refugee before he joined to go to Syria. He said he
enlisted after he saw a video of Islamic State fighters playing football with a
chopped head. His relatives said he joined after a romantic heartbreak.

Iran has long relied more on soft power than armed might in Afghanistan,
playing up its cultural, religious and economic influence in western Afghan
districts near the border. And though Iran resents the presence of the United
 States military on its border, it has mostly supported the American-backed
administration in Kabul, choosing stability over chaos.

But as the war in Afghanistan has stretched late into a second decade, and
with the stability of the central government in question, Iran has begun
hedging its bets, American and Afghan officials say. That has extended
to improving its ties with the Taliban, a group it had long seen as an
ideological enemy.

Afghan officials acknowledge that they have not yet seen evidence that Iran
was actively rallying Fatemiyoun veterans. But the officials are deeply
concerned that the groundwork is being laid. And statements by Irans
military leaders, as well as their use of Afghan fighters in other conflicts,
suggests that Iran sees the force as an asset in future engagements.

Brig. Gen. Ismail Qaani, the deputy commander of the Quds force within the
Revolutionary Guards, recently told a memorial for Afghan fighters that Syria
was just a temporary goal in a larger vision.

Photo
Residents of Yakawlang, in the Afghan province of Bamian, held a mourning ceremony
in October to commemorate a Taliban massacre of Shiites there in 2001. CreditMujib
Mashal/The New York Times
Fatemiyoun is a new culture a collection of brave men who do not see
boundaries and borders in defending Islamic values, General Qaani said, as
quoted in the local Iranian media.

The war in Yemen is one indication of how Afghans are already being drawn
deeper into the Iranian-Saudi rivalry, on both sides. Not only did Iran send
smaller units of the Fatemiyoun to cross Syrian borders and fight in Yemen,
but at least 1,000 Sunni Afghan refugees from camps in Pakistan have also
been recruited to fight on Saudi Arabias behalf in Yemen, according to three
senior Afghan officials.

The core of what is now the Fatemiyoun Division included fighters from
Shiite militias that had Iranian support during the Afghan civil war. Some
even went to Iraq to fight on behalf of Iran against Saddam Hussein, or to
Lebanon to oppose the Israeli invasion.

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Many of the Afghan fighters, mostly recruited from among Afghan refugees or
illegal laborers in Iran, join for the salary of about $600 a month, and for the
promise of Iranian residency paperwork after a deployment to Syria, which
usually lasts three months. But they soon realize that the benefits are
designed as a hook: The paperwork needs to be validated every year, and that
requires enlisting again.

Here, I am scared of the government, of Daesh, said one former

Fatemiyoun fighter who has returned to Kabul, using another name for the
Islamic State. And if I dont go back to Syria, my Iranian passport will lose
validity.

Afghan officials say the Iranian police have intensified a crackdown on illegal
Afghan immigrants, arresting as many as 200 a day. When they arrive at
deportation centers, Iranian military officers are there to offer another
option.

They said: You had come from Afghanistan to work, to make money. We
give you two options: You go to Syria, and we pay you money. Or you go back
to your country, said the former fighter in Yakawlang, who asked to be
identified only as Jawed. He was detained while working at an Iranian
construction site and taken to a deportation center where, out of 200 Afghan
detainees, he became one of about 60 who chose to serve in Syria. After
returning to Afghanistan, he joined the Afghan Army.

Extensive ideological indoctrination is a central part of their service. Recruits

are told the war in Syria is a defense of some of the holiest shrines of the
Shiite faith from attack by the Islamic State a group their recruiters then
describe as a creation of the United States to destabilize the Middle East.

My intention was Syria, to defend the shrine, said the Afghan fighter who
returned to his home in Yakawlang, and who wanted to be identified only by
the name Abas.

Abas described his fellow Afghan fighters being pitched into battles that
resembled the brutality of the Afghan civil war.

You know how the Afghan boys fight they wouldnt even leave a chicken
behind, he said. A unit leader would say, We will capture this hill. What is
in it for us? We want this much money. Three hundred people would go, 30
would come back.

Other fighters described similarly heavy casualties. One said 15 of his

comrades were killed on the first night they arrived at the front lines. And
Jawed said there was a day when his unit lost 45 men.

They tell you are defending the shrine of Zainab, and that is true: We believe
in defending our religion and faith, Jawed said. But when you get there, you
realize you have been brought to the slaughterhouse of a war of major
powers.