The Afghan diaspora – in pictures

For the past four years, Dutch photographer Joël van Houdt has been documenting the journeys of Afghan refugees around the world. In Afghanistan, there is a dearth of information about the reality of the refugee experience. Van Houdt moved to Kabul in 2010 and witnessed the soaring optimism created by the US surge in which money and human resources were pumped into the beleaguered state. By the time he left in 2015, the optimism had turned to utter hopelessness. The question his Afghan friends most routinely asked him was how to leave the country.

These photographs are from an exhibition simultaneously displayed in the offices of the Guardian in London and on blast walls in the centre of Kabul

Joël van Houdt

Main image: Greece, June 2017 Teenager Mortaza swims in the Aegean Sea off the island of Lesbos. Turkey can be seen in the background. He is staying nearby with other Afghan minors, who are waiting for the Greek government to decide on their request for asylum Photograph: Joël van Houdt

  • Afghanistan, September 2012

    Afghans ride in a truck with people smugglers in Nimruz, a remote province in southwestern Afghanistan. They will cross into Pakistan’s Baluchistan before entering Iran
    Afghanistan, September 2012 Afghans ride in a truck

  • Afghanistan, September 2012

    Gulbadeen was injured by a landmine when his truck tried to cross into Pakistan. He waits for a bus to Herat province near his home
    Afghanistan, September 2012 Gulbadeen was injured by a landmine

  • Afghanistan, March 2016

    Sharif Udin listens from a tree in Herat as a police commander calls out the names of new passport holders. He is one of many hoping to find work in neighbouring Iran
    Afghanistan, March 2016 Sharif Udin listens from a tree in Herat

  • England, September 2017

    Gurmeet Kaur stands on the stairs while her husband Pritpal Singh sits with their daughter Ganeev in their house in Southall. Gurmeet and Pritpal left Kabul during the civil war in the 1990s
    England, September 2017 Gurmeet Kaur stands on the stairs

  • England, May 2017

    Nazir sells fruits and vegetables in northern London, 12 hours a day and seven days a week. He arrived in the UK six years ago via Calais, and received the right to stay one year ago. He left his university studies in Baghlan in northern Afghanistan to become a refugee
    England, May 2017 Nazir sells fruits and vegetables in northern London

  • Serbia, December 2016

    Afghan and Pakistani men sit by a fire in a derelict warehouse behind Belgrade’s central train station. With the borders to EU countries closed, many have been stuck here for months
    Serbia, December 2016 Afghan and Pakistani men sit by a fire

  • Germany, March 2017

    Afghans celebrate Nowruz, the Persian New Year, in a suburb of Frankfurt. Men dance and listen to a performance by Hamayoun Angar, an Afghan singer who became a refugee in Europe a couple of years previously
    Germany, March 2017 Afghans celebrate Nowruz

  • Germany, April 2017

    The former airport of Tempelhof is now a refugee shelter in Berlin. Around half of the 500 refugees staying here are from Afghanistan, and many have been here for over one year
    Germany, April 2017 The former airport of Tempelhof

  • Greece, May 2016

    Khalid sleeps by the road near the Macedonian border. Macedonian police chased him back to Greece after he trekked through high terrain for several days. He fled his native Nangarhar province in eastern Afghanistan after attacks by Islamic State started to increase
    Greece, May 2016 Khalid sleeps by the road

  • Greece, June 2017

    Teenager Mortaza swims in the Aegean Sea off the island of Lesbos. Turkey can be seen in the background. He is staying nearby with other Afghan minors, who are waiting for the Greek government to decide on their request for asylum
    Greece, June 2017 Teenager Mortaza swims in the Aegean Sea

  • Greece, June 2017

    The grave of an Afghan child on a hillside on the island of Chios. He died when his family crossed from Turkey into Greece in February 2016, and is buried in a Greek Orthodox graveyard with other migrants who perished attempting to reach Europe. No one knows the cause of death, but the local government suspects he died in a stampede.
    Greece, June 2017 The grave of an Afghan child

  • Turkey, July 2017

    Each Sunday, Afghan men gather in Sahil Park in Istanbul to watch each other wrestle. Many Afghans live here, often waiting for a chance to travel to the European Union
    Turkey, July 2017 Each Sunday, Afghan men gather in Sahil Park in Istanbul

  • US, July 2016

    Afghans gather to pray and celebrate Eid-al- Fitr, the end of Ramadan, in Sacramento, California. Most served as interpreters for the US armed forces and USaid
    USA, July 2016 Afghans gather to pray

  • Indonesia, September 2013

    Asylum seekers from Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq ride on a bus back to their safe houses in Jakarta after a failed attempt to leave for Australia by boat. The Indonesian police had intercepted their convoy while on the southern coast of Java.
    Indonesia, September 2013 Asylum seekers from Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq

  • France, October 2016

    An Afghan refugee stands with his belongings by his tent, which has been set alight, in The Jungle. He was one of an estimated 8,000 refugees and migrants staying in the camp and trying to reach the UK
    France, October 2016 An Afghan refugee stands with his belongings by his tent

  • France, October 2016

    An Afghan refugee is escorted out of The Jungle in Calais by French police officers on the day the camp is shut down
    France, October 2016 An Afghan refugee is escorted out of The Jungle

  • Russia, May 2017

    Masuma walks in Gorky Park in Moscow. Now an engineering PhD student, two years previously Masuma left her hometown of Herat in western Afghanistan after she received threats for working with foreigners in the election commission
    Russia, May 2017 Masuma walks in Gorky Park
Topics