"When I went to the police station they took me to a cell and gave me a mattress. There were cockroaches crawling and biting me, I thought to myself this is similar to a police station in Afghanistan!"
“When I went to the police station they took me to a cell and gave me a mattress. There were cockroaches crawling and biting me, I thought to myself this is similar to a police station in Afghanistan!”
It’s just after midnight at Auckland International Airport when Khalid, who we agreed not to name to protect his identity, arrived in late August 2012. He’d disposed of his passport during the final transit before reaching Auckland.
His eyes scan the arrivals area. He finds a policeman and declares he is here to seek asylum. “I was taken to Customs to be strip-searched. It was such a shock you know. Because of my religion, this is not something that I wanted to do,” he says.
Initially he protests but he’s tired and scared and eventually relents to the process. “After they searched me I was taken into a room and questioned. I was so exhausted. It took about two hours.”