Over 2,000 Afghan fighters killed in Syria – Commander

A commander of an Iranian-backed Afghan Shia militia said on Sunday that to date over 2,000 Afghans have been killed fighting in Syria.

“Over 2,000 Afghan fighters sent by Iran to the Syria conflict were killed, while 8,000 others were wounded,” Zahr Mujahid, a commander of the Fatemiyoun Division, affiliated with Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, told Iranian-based Besic news.

Mujahid earlier told Iran’s Tasnim News Agency: “The discrimination against Afghan fighters in Iran has reached such a point that some people differentiate between Iranian and Afghan soldiers martyred in combat.”

The Fatemiyoun Division, founded by Afghans who emigrated to Iran, was first sent to Syria in 2013, two years after the Syrian regime’s bloody attack on peaceful protests in 2011.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, which supports the Bashar al-Assad regime, use Fatemiyoun soldiers on the front lines.

Iranian militia forces along with the Fatemiyoun and Zeynebiyyoun Divisions form the main elements Tehran sent to war-ravaged Syria to aid the Syrian regime, all fighting under the banner of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.

Iran is home to an estimated 3 million Afghans, many of whom fled persecution and armed conflict in their home country, which borders Iran.