ARWA DAMON: Up in the darkness, on the side of a steep hill,
dozens of mostly Afghan refugees are
picking their way through the thorny, rocky slopes.
They just crossed the Iranian border into Eastern Turkey.
The handful of Turkish security forces we are with
are scattered below, being guided by others
Manning a thermal camera.
[non-english speech]
ARWA DAMON: OK, they're telling them to go left into the front.
Turkey doesn't want the refugees here,
and their final destination, Europe,
doesn't want them there.
The shots are blanks intended to scare.
ARWA DAMON: For this small group of Afghans, it's over.
And yet, despite the grueling journey, the sudden evaporation
of his dreams, one of the young men
realizes I am struggling with the slippery descent
and insists on helping me.
Thank you.
He's an athletic student, a sprinter.
Another in the group, a pro mixed martial arts fighter.
They don't want to appear on camera
they say it would break their parents
hearts to see them captured.
It was dark, so dark [inaudible] who
we met a few days earlier in a deportation center remembers.
- [non-english speech].
ARWA DAMON: It was their son, Amir, just 10 years old,
who kept them going.
What were you thinking when you were going through all of this,
and you were pulling your dad and carrying the bags?
- [non-english speech]
ARWA DAMON: I was just thinking that we have to reach a country
that is safe, he responds.
You're very brave.
- [non-english speech]
ARWA DAMON: It was for my future, his sister Sara says.
I can't study in Afghanistan.
Zainab does not want her daughter to be
robbed of her right to learn, not
the way she was 20+ years ago.
So you went to a secret school, one of
the secret underground schools?
- [non-english speech].
ARWA DAMON: It was under a house, she says.
The door would stay shut so no one
would know girls were there.
She's broken in more ways than she can put into words.
They all are.
She doesn't know how long they will be here.
Turkey halted deportations to Afghanistan after Kabul fell.
Some of those who evade capture hide out in small ravines,
waiting for their payment to the smugglers
to come through so they can move on to the next leg.
So you were in the military?
- Yeah, in Afghanistan.
ARWA DAMON: He was part of a local anti-Taliban unit.
He sent his wife and three children
into hiding after receiving threatening phone calls.
He left them behind so they can be reunited in a better place,
one day, some day, suffering through the humiliation
of waiting out here.
Many of those we spoke to said it
took them numerous attempts just to get across the border
into Turkey.
Turkey has been beefing up its border security, doubling
the number of guard towers, infrared cameras, motion
sensors with Europe's support.
Turkey is pushing refugees back, at times,
forcefully and violently.
The day after crossing the border,
the captured refugees we met had already
been forced back into Iran.
They say they are now hiding from thieves,
but nothing will stop those that have nothing
left but broken promises.
ARWA DAMON: A question that should
echo throughout America's halls of power,
whose policies failed the Afghan people and led to this.
Arwa Damon, CNN Van, Turkey.