Afghans searching for asylum say they’re caught in a hellish limbo as all migration suspended to the U.S.
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Hundreds of Afghans ready for asylum say they’re now in limbo. The Trump administration has stopped issuing visas to these touring on Afghan passports and paused all asylum determination in response to this week’s killing of a Nationwide Guard soldier and the wounding of one other by an Afghan nationwide. NPR’s Diaa Hadid has been chatting with some ready for asylum and joins us now from Mumbai. Diaa, thanks for being with us.
DIAA HADID, BYLINE: You are welcome, Scott.
SIMON: What have these Afghans been saying to you?
HADID: They have been telling me how distressed they’re. These are actually darkish days for the sub-265,000 Afghans who advocates say have been within the pipeline to come back to the U.S., like Roshangar (ph). He was within the Afghan navy. He used to log off on airstrikes focusing on Taliban fighters. He is now in hiding in Afghanistan in worry of his life, which is why I will not use his full title. However Roshangar informed me, Scott, that he was ashamed of the Afghan nationwide behind the Wednesday assault in D.C., and he added this.
ROSHANGAR: It is very irritating for us as a result of that was that individual’s duty and act. That was not an act from the entire Afghan group.
HADID: And that sense was additionally echoed by Najib Paiykan (ph). He is 45 and was a journalist, and he is now residing in hiding in Turkey. He spoke in Dari to producer Fariba Akbari.
NAJIB PAIYKAN: (Talking Dari).
HADID: And what he is saying there’s, what is the distinction between a person who punishes each countryman for the crime of 1 individual and the Taliban, who imprison a household for the crimes of 1 son?
SIMON: Diaa, what are you able to inform us about Afghans who have been within the course of to come back to the USA?
HADID: Proper. Effectively, most of those individuals labored and fought alongside U.S. forces or America’s allies in Afghanistan, like Roshangar, or they have been outspoken critics of the Taliban. However, Scott, this is not the primary time the Trump administration has tried to restrict the admission of Afghan nationals. And to people like Roshangar, meaning his life has turn out to be increasingly more perilous. And I seen that, as a result of as he was chatting with me, he was stuttering. After which he informed me why.
ROSHANGAR: I’ve a enamel downside. I can not go to dentist. My son is out of college for 4 years. We live in uncertainty beneath the Taliban repressive regime.
HADID: Such uncertainty. One other lady, Surayya (ph), who was additionally within the pipeline to come back – after I first bought to know her, she was residing in Pakistan, on the point of go to the U.S. However in June, she and her daughters have been deported, and now they reside beneath the Taliban, too, the place ladies are banned from most jobs. And her daughters aren’t allowed to check past grade six. She’s additionally in hiding, which is why I am not utilizing her full title. And she or he’s one of many tons of of hundreds of Afghans that Pakistan has forcibly deported this 12 months, together with individuals who have been meant to go to the USA.
SIMON: The Trump administration says Afghans who entered the U.S. weren’t correctly vetted. What have you ever discovered by speaking to Afghan nationals?
HADID: Effectively, they are saying they do not know what the People have been doing behind the scenes, however somebody like Roshangar mentioned his utility was in course of for 3 years earlier than Trump suspended it. He’d completed three interviews and was scheduled to do a fourth, and he described them to me like this.
ROSHANGAR: So they’re asking about my background, about my members of the family, about my spouse, my spouse’s household, my job, my first job and my second job, my e mail addresses, my handle of livings.
HADID: It was so intensive, and he had to supply that info going again a decade. One outstanding advocate, Shawn VanDiver from AfghanEvac, says these migrants are extensively and exhaustively vetted. He says any gaps to the system needs to be fastened however says one Afghan shooter actually do not mirror the overwhelming majority of Afghan migrants who are supposed to come to the USA.
SIMON: Diaa Hadid, thanks a lot.
HADID: You are welcome, Scott.
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