When Waheed Arian was 5, his father knelt by his side and handed him a big, colourful kite. That small moment, in Afghanistan, seared itself into the son’s memory.
“I was a child born into war,” said Arian, now 39, and a medical doctor. “I had no idea what normality was like and I only have a couple of happy memories like this from the first years of my life.”
Those years, in the late 1980s and 1990s, were spent in the chaos of war, with uncertainty swirling around him, first in his home city of Kabul; then in a refugee camp in Pakistan where he was displaced with his family; and then back to an Afghanistan engulfed in civil war.
Decades later, driven by hopes of one day becoming a doctor, he established a new life in Britain, where he overcame post-traumatic stress disorder, learned English and studied medicine at Cambridge University, eventually becoming an emergency room doctor.
“I came in with no family support and hardly an education,” Arian said. “But I wanted to do something with my life and I was taking steps toward it, although it was a long shot.”
Two years ago, he published “In the Wars,” a memoir about his journey from Kabul to Britain as an asylum-seeker. His story, a personal tale of overcoming odds, illustrates how Britain’s asylum system has long provided sanctuary and opportunity for countless people.
But in recent years, successive Conservative governments have cracked down on the process, particularly with policies intended to deter asylum-seekers from crossing the English Channel.
In March, , the government introduced legislation that would expel all people who arrive on small boats crossing the Channel without hearing their asylum claims, a position that has been criticised by human rights groups. The British government says that many who arrive this way are economic migrants, and that the policy will act as a deterrent. Government data, though, shows that the majority who reach shore are eventually granted asylum.
Arian said his own journey showed “what can be done when you allow people to realise their potential.”
“In this case, you can see the future I’ve got,” he said. “But there are so many other futures on the line.”
Speaking from his home in Chester in northwestern England, Arian, a father of two, recounted the arduous journey that led him out of Afghanistan.
When his parents sent him to Britain in 1999, alone at 15, it was a tough decision for them, he said. But, he explained, “I was at risk of being taken as a military soldier.” He added, “I didn’t have a future. I wanted to become a doctor, not a killer.”
So his parents scraped together the money to pay a man to help him get to Britain to join a family friend.
He boarded a plane from Islamabad, Pakistan, a false passport in hand, and claimed asylum when he arrived.
“As soon as I landed in the UK, I was handcuffed and I was put in a prison,” he said. “But I did come with that hope of safety, and the dream to become a doctor.”
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