Iranian state media reported Friday that decisions on deporting Afghan migrants have been handed over to the country’s eastern provinces, a move officials said would ease the burden on the central government.
According to IRIB, Governor Gholamhossein Mozaffari of Razavi Khorasan province said migration management had become one of his administration’s top priorities. He noted that several provincial security council meetings have been dedicated to the issue and that a special committee had been formed to oversee the process.
Speaking at a meeting on migration policy in Mashhad, Mozaffari urged that activities of Iran’s National Migration Organization be concentrated in the eastern provinces, given their strategic location along the Afghan border.
He also suggested comparative studies of migration laws in other countries, noting that in many places residency is tied to investment. “In many countries, the presence of foreigners is linked to investment,” Mozaffari said. “If someone wants to obtain residency, they must invest in a specific program.”
The governor added that Razavi Khorasan plays a central role in Iran’s economic interactions with Afghanistan and should be directly responsible for managing shared economic capacities between the two countries.
Figures by the Taliban-run statistics authority shows that 1.8 million migrants were deported from Iran over the past three months.
