Refugee tells Afghan story in images

Jim O’Rourke
September 3, 2011

Abdul Karim Hekmat arrived in Australia in 2001, one of 170 asylum seekers crammed onto a leaking fishing boat for a dangerous five-day voyage from Indonesia.
The then 20-year-old Afghan risked the journey to Ashmore Reef, off Australia’s northwest coast, after fleeing Taliban persecution in his homeland.
Mr Hekmat is from the Hazara minority, Shiite Muslims who live in the predominantly Sunni Muslim country. He said the Hazara suffer at the hands of the hardline Taliban as well as enduring political, cultural and economic discrimination from the majority Pashtun and Tajik ethnic groups. Some of his relatives were tortured by the Taliban.


Now an Australian citizen, a youth worker and freelance writer, he has graduated with an honours degree in communications and social inquiry from the University of Technology, Sydney.
To document his people’s ongoing battle for survival, he travelled last year to his home provence of Ghazni, armed with a camera.
An exhibition of his photographs depicting the Hazaras’ personal struggle in coping with their homes, businesses and schools being targeted by the Taliban opens at UTS tomorrow.
Mr Hekmat said the Hazaras are also discriminated against by the Afghan government.
He said the Australian government insists many Hazara do not need protection and in January this year signed an agreement with the Afghan government to repatriate 49 Hazara refugees, including a 15-year-old boy.
There are about 2400 Afghan asylum seekers in detention waiting for final determination of their refugee status.
Mr Hekmat feared many of them would have been sent to Malaysia as part of the government’s refugee swap scheme, and miss out on a chance to settle in Australia.
But the High Court decision last week that the so-called Malaysia solution was unlawful has given him hope they may eventually be able to stay.
‘‘The High Court decision was very welcome news, but we still don’t know where they will end up.
‘‘The Hazara are still being killed by the Taliban. The Afghan government is not passing on the benefits from the billions of dollars it receives in overseas aid. It not is not providing for their basic needs.
‘‘Australia should tear up the agreement with Afghanistan to send the Hazara home.’’
‘‘Unsafe Haven: Hazaras in Afghanistan’’, opens tomorrow, UTS Tower Foyer, Level 4, 15 Broadway, Ultimo.

Source,

The Sydney Morning Herald