Risking it all: Afghans face a perilous journey across 12 countries through jungles and rivers to reach Canada

After the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan in August 2021, thousands of Afghans who had worked with NATO forces, including the U.S. and Canada, were evacuated from Afghanistan through special programs.

So far, Canada has welcomed over 32,000 vulnerable Afghans, including those who assisted the government of Canada, journalists and human rights activists. 

But many of the vulnerable Afghans who were not on the list of evacuees in Western countries took temporary refuge in neighbouring countries such as Iran, Pakistan and Tajikistan—and some have made long and dangerous journeys through multiple continents with the aim of reaching Canada.

"It was not important to me which country I would go to, what mattered to me was finding peace and being accepted as an immigrant there, where I could be protected,” Hamid, whose real name CTV News agreed not to use to protect his identity, said in an interview with CTVNews.ca.

To make his dream come true, Hamid decided to leave Iran where he had been living for a year, studying and working as a general labourer after he was forced to leave Afghanistan.

Hamid was working with the former Afghan government in Kabul and studying for a master’s degree at a university in Iran, which was offering online courses at the time due to COVID-19.

Before the Taliban fighters reached Kabul, where he was living, he felt that he needed to leave, because if the Taliban discovered that he worked with the former Afghan government, his life would be in danger.

Hamid thought it would be a good idea to ask the university where he was pursuing his master’s degree to help him to get out of Afghanistan, and fortunately, it worked. Hamid found himself in Iran a week after the Taliban entered Kabul.

Amidst the chaos and uncertainty that followed the Taliban's return to power, about one million Afghans found themselves displaced in Iran in search of safety, most of them with no legal documentation.

Hamid was fortunate to have obtained a visa that protected him from potential arrest by Iranian police. However, he remained concerned about the possibility of his visa expiring.

Then, a glimmer of hope emerged, as news spread of Brazil's humanitarian visa program, which aimed to provide refuge to those fleeing conflict and persecution. Despite not being the primary destination for Afghan refugees, Brazil's open-hearted approach and commitment to humanitarianism presented a lifeline to those desperately seeking safety.

Hamid got Brazil’s visa and flew safely to his next destination, Sao Paulo.

In order to protect the privacy and safety of their families in Afghanistan, the individuals known as Hamid and Sabor have opted to use pseudonyms as their preferred names.

TO CANADA AND THE U.S.

“The real journey starts from here,” said Sabor, another Afghan who also benefited from Brazil’s humanitarian visa from Iran to go to Sao Paulo. Sabor is not his real name. CTV News is using a pseudonym to protect his identity.

After spending 23 days in a refugee camp in Sao Paulo, Sabor noticed that a few of his roommates and friends who had also arrived there were leaving the camp discreetly, without informing him or others about their destinations.

“I saw one of my friend’s picture on Facebook showing him in California, when I asked him how he got there, he said if you have US$2,000, leave,” Sabor described.

According to the asylum seekers that CTVNews.ca spoke with, they typically refrain from sharing the specifics of their journey with others as a precautionary measure to avoid attracting attention and potentially falling into the hands of human traffickers. Refugees who have enough money to pay human smugglers a higher fee will have an easier journey while the ones with less money will be taken through more dangerous and perilous routes, mostly by foot.

According to the refugees, part of the money they gave to human smugglers was used to bribe the border police of countries they cross along the journey to arrive in the U.S.

Nasrullah Babor’s journey began in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and from there he traveled to Peru. Subsequently, he made his way through Ecuador, Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, and the United States before finally arriving in Canada. Hamid and Sabor made the same journey at different times.

“I was three months on the way and spent about US$7,000 to get to Canada,” said Babor, who started his journey to Canada in August 2022, a week after he arrived in Brazil from Pakistan.

Babor says he saw five dead bodies in the Panama jungle, people who likely died of hunger or exhaustion.

“You could see the doomsday in your own eyes. Nobody helps you there,” he said.

Brazil has been offering humanitarian visas to vulnerable Afghan nationals which allows refugees to stay up to six months in Brazil, and then they can apply for another two-year permit, according to Sabor.

It was time for Sabor to leave, but there was a problem. He did not have enough money to give smugglers.

“I borrowed some money from my friends overseas and made US$2000 ready” Sabor said.

Sabor along with six other refugees from Pakistan, India, China and Venezuela headed to the border of Peru. They gave US$700 each to a smuggler named Sandra to take them to the seaport of Necocli on the Caribbean coast.

“She (Sandra) did not accompany us the whole journey. She had other smugglers ready on each country’s border to take us,” added Sabor.

By the time Sabor’s group arrived in Colombia they had travelled with three smugglers, and to each, they paid US$100 extra in order to bribe the border police of the countries they passed through, according to Sabor.

CROSSING THE DARIEN GAP

For most Afghans, the challenging part of the journey starts in Necoclí, a Colombian town on the edge of the Darien Gap that connects Central and South America.

There are no roads that go through the thick jungles of the Darien Gap, which means asylum seekers usually have to take small boats and walk for hundreds of kilometres to reach their destination.

After three days in Necoclí, Sabor and his friends met another smuggler who promised to take them through a supposedly easy way with less walking for US$350. Later, Sabor’s group – which has since grown to 30 people – realized that the smuggler had lied.

“Through the treacherous jungle, we walked for five days and nights. It was a place of unparalleled danger, unlike anything I had ever witnessed. With rocky terrain, muddy paths, and an unpredictable landscape, every step was a challenge. There were places where the mud reached knee-deep, yet we pressed on, determined to cross whatever obstacles lay before us," Sabor said.

Hamid also characterized the Panamanian jungle as the most dangerous part of the journey.

“There is only you and your God. No one else,” he said.

“Each day, we endured the grueling task of walking through the jungle for 14 hours, starting at 4 a.m. and continuing until 10 p.m. The journey was incredibly challenging as we encountered rugged mountains and treacherous rocky terrain. Every step required utmost caution, for the slightest misstep could have meant a fatal fall. The constant awareness of the imminent danger reminded us of the high stakes we faced with each passing second."

Hamid said that if something happens to anyone in the jungle, no one stops to help.

“In this journey, a second option simply did not exist. We had a family from Bangladesh in our group that wanted to leave their three children in the jungle. They literally left them three times but my teammates and I rescued the children,” he said.

Hamid says during the last 24 hours of the journey in the Jungle they walked with no food or water.

After three months of enduring hardship during their respective journeys through South and Central America, Hamid, Sabor and Babor arrived in the U.S. after making their way over the Trump wall at the Mexican border. However, they soon realized that obtaining long-term residency and reuniting with their families in the U.S. was an unlikely possibility. Consequently, they made the decision to continue their journey to Canada, in search of a peaceful place to call home.

They arrived in Canada on different dates in December 2022, passing through the border at Roxham Road, the unofficial route for refugees to cross into Canada before Canada and the U.S. agreed in March to amend the Safe Third Country Agreement and end irregural crossings. Crossing into Canadian territory, they said they were “arrested” by Canadian border police and taken for further investigation.

Hours later, they were guided to temporary accommodations in Ontario and Montreal. Sabor was taken to Montreal, where he spent about a month in a hotel before finding his way to Toronto.

In Toronto, Sabor endured a lengthy two-month waiting period to obtain vital documents, including the work permit and the primary identification and status document known as the "brown paper." The document serves as a crucial credential for asylum claimants in Canada, it grants the holder legal authorization to work and reside in Canada.

Hamid and Babor initially sought refuge in a hotel near Niagara Falls, they recently successfully got their work permits and "brown papers." Their work permits are valid until 2025, providing them with a stable foundation, while their "brown papers" guarantees their lawful status in Canada until 2027.

Hamid and Sabor are both married and have children still living in Afghanistan, but Babor is single. They all made the challenging journey separately.

Reporting for this story was paid for through The Afghan Journalists in Residence Project funded by Meta.