With its ferris wheel, coffee shops and promenades, Tehran’s Chitgar Lake has been a popular spot for Iranians since it was opened to the public in 2013. But it has also become a hangout for young Afghan men, and a focus for growing public resentment of the mass immigration since the Taliban retook control of Afghanistan in 2021. Many Iranians – ordinary citizens and politicians – have intensified their rhetoric toward Afghans, with growing calls for crackdowns and mass deportations.
In the 18 months after the Taliban retook control of Afghanistan in August 2021, an estimated 1 million Afghans sought refuge and work in Iran, joining 2 million Afghan refugees already in the country. Since the Iranian government’s last headcount in 2022, young Afghan men have continued to cross the border in large numbers, and in 2024 the country’s interior minister now estimates the number of Afghans illegally in Iran at between 5 and 8 million, in a country with a total population of 89 million.
