Kabul. Imran Ullah stands behind a huge pot of chicken soup in the middle of Kabul. He sells them in small paper cups in the afternoon. "I smile in front of my customers and my children because a father is not allowed to show his fear. But I'm drowning in worry," says Ullah.
He had only had one customer in the past two hours. He reports that he barely earns enough to buy bread. A few months ago everything was fine - before the deportation from Pakistan to Afghanistan.
The United Nations fears that the hunger crisis in Afghanistan will worsen as winter approaches. There are several reasons for this. On the one hand, tensions between the two neighboring countries Afghanistan and Pakistan have recently increased. Millions of people with Afghan roots were forced back to their homeland. Border crossings have been closed for over a year due to armed conflict - and an important import route for Afghanistan has also been interrupted.
Added to this is the war in the other neighboring country, Iran, which is causing food prices to rise worldwide. In addition, international aid funds have been plummeting for years. Except for deportations from Europe, Western governments hardly want to work with the ruling Islamist Taliban - also because of their disregard for women's rights. With dwindling donations, organizations continue to cut benefits for Afghans.
Food is currently definitely available in Afghanistan. However, people simply cannot afford them, said Olga Cherevko from the UN Coordination Office for Afghanistan in mid-October. A third of the almost 49 million Afghans are already living in acute food insecurity - this winter there could be 19.2 million people, almost two million more than last year.
Rice and flour in particular have become more expensive in the past year, reports the World Food Program (WFP). But potatoes now also cost 37 percent more than last year. This is difficult for many to pay, also because work is scarce in the country. According to WFP information, an unskilled day laborer can currently only find work two days a week. He earns an average of 300 Afghanis a day - the equivalent of around four euros. In return, he gets less than three kilograms of low-quality rice in Kabul.
In Haji Safiullah Khan's family, only his two sons have jobs. He too is afraid of winter. He is currently shopping for the essentials in a small supermarket in Kabul. He fills beans, lentils and small croissant noodles into plastic bags with a metal shovel. Rice in particular has become expensive, he says. Now they bought less, opted for cheaper products and sometimes had them written to them.
“When the wind turns cold, fear comes into our house before winter does,” says Safiullah Khan. "Food and rent are already eating up every Afghani my sons earn, and now we have to raise money for coal, fuel, and heat. But from where?" Today he sometimes skips a meal so that his children have enough. "A man of my age should rest, be respected. But I spend my days ashamed and helpless, counting the coins as if they were drops of water in a desert," says Safiullah Khan.
Since the Taliban came to power in August 2021, a total of more than four million people have returned - around a tenth of the country's population. Both neighboring countries are stumbling economically and no longer want to afford the Afghans in the country.
The conflict between Pakistan and Afghanistan, which dates back to British colonial times, has escalated massively in the past year with mutual attacks. Islamabad accuses those in power in Kabul of supporting terrorism. The Taliban reject this. But in Pakistan the mood has turned against the Afghans. Further forced deportations in the border provinces are feared.
Imran Ullah, who now sells soup, is one of the displaced. In Haripur - not far from the Pakistani capital Islamabad - he earned enough as an assistant in a gold shop to support his family, and it was also enough for occasional gifts for others. When he had to leave Pakistan, it destroyed his self-confidence, his inner peace and his perspective on the future, he says now in Kabul. “It felt like the ground had disappeared from under my feet.”
Ullah ladles his chicken soup from the large pot into paper cups. As a side dish, customers can choose hard-boiled eggs or chili sauce to accompany the soup. He dreams of owning his own restaurant. The dreams are the light that he holds on to in the darkness. “When I imagine my children in a good classroom, with books in their hands, clean uniforms and hopeful faces, a warmth blooms in my chest and for a moment it hurts less,” says Ullah.
