Tag Archives: Afghan allies

Majority of Afghan allies may have missed out on airlift – U.S. official

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States may have left behind the majority of Afghans who helped in the 20-year war effort along with their families as U.S. citizens were prioritized in the airlift that came to an end this week, a senior State Department official said on Wednesday.

The departure of the last U.S. military flights out of Kabul on Monday marked the end of an operation that saw more than 123,000 people brought out of Afghanistan in less than two weeks.

President Joe Biden has pledged to keep helping 100 to 200 U.S. citizens left in the country who wanted to leave and a much larger group of at-risk Afghans, including former interpreters for the U.S. military.

Asked how many potential applicants to the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) program for Afghan allies and their families remained in Kabul, a senior State Department official said they could not provide an estimate.

“But I would say it’s the majority of them just based on anecdotal information about the populations we were able to support,” the official said. About 2,000 SIV applicants were brought to the United States before the broader airlift began in mid-August.

Initial efforts to prioritize those Afghans for evacuation were marred by security concerns at the airport gates and difficulties in giving them credentials that could not be replicated, the official said.

U.S. officials had a legal obligation to help American citizens who were stuck in Kabul and prioritized their departure, the official said. About 5,500 U.S. citizens were on evacuation flights from Kabul after Aug. 14, according to the State Department.

“Everybody who lived it is haunted by the choices we had to make and by the people we were not able to help depart in this first phase of the operation,” the official said.

(Reporting by Simon Lewis, Arshad Mohammed and Humeyra Pamuk; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

U.S. completes withdrawal of forces from Afghanistan

(Reuters) -The United States completed the withdrawal of its forces from Afghanistan, the Pentagon said on Monday, after a chaotic evacuation of thousands of Americans and Afghan allies to close out U.S. involvement there after 20 years of conflict.

The operation came to an end before the Tuesday deadline set by President Joe Biden, who has drawn heavy criticism from both Democrats and Republicans for his handling of Afghanistan since the Taliban made rapid advances and took over Kabul earlier this month.

The withdrawal was announced by General Frank McKenzie, commander of the U.S. Central Command, who said the final flights did not include some of the dozens of Americans who remained behind.

More than 122,000 people have been airlifted out of Kabul since Aug. 14, the day before the Taliban regained control of the country two decades after being removed from power by the U.S.-led invasion in 2001.

The United States and its Western allies scrambled to save citizens of their own countries as well as translators, local embassy staff, civil rights activists, journalists and other Afghans vulnerable to reprisals.

The evacuations became even more perilous when a suicide bomb attack claimed by Islamic State – enemy of both the West and the Taliban – killed 13 U.S. service members and scores of Afghans waiting by the airport gates on Thursday.

Biden promised after the bloody Kabul airport attack to hunt down the people responsible.

The departure took place after U.S. anti-missile defenses intercepted rockets fired at Kabul’s airport.

Two U.S. officials said “core” diplomatic staff were among 6,000 Americans to have left. They did not say whether that included top envoy Ross Wilson, expected to be among the last civilians to depart.

A U.S. official said initial reports did not indicate any U.S. casualties from as many as five missiles fired on the airport. Islamic State claimed responsibility for the rocket attacks.

In recent days, Washington has warned of more attacks, while carrying out two air strikes. It said both hit Islamic State targets, one thwarting an attempted suicide bombing in Kabul on Sunday by destroying a car packed with explosives, but which Afghans said had struck civilians.

Tuesday’s deadline for troops to leave was set by Biden, fulfilling an agreement reached with the Taliban by his predecessor, Donald Trump to end the United States’ longest war.

But having failed to anticipate that the Taliban would so quickly conquer the country, Washington and its NATO allies were forced into a hasty exit. They leave behind thousands of Afghans who helped Western countries and might have qualified for evacuation.

(Reporting by Reuters bureaus and Idrees Ali and Rupam Jain; Additional reporting by Joseph Nasr in Berlin; Writing by Clarence Fernandez, Peter Graff, William Maclean and Steve Holland; Editing by Angus MacSwan, Catherine Evans and Peter Cooney)

U.S. cannot say how many Afghan refugees it has received, situation ‘fluid’

By Andrea Shalal and Ted Hesson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A senior U.S. official on Tuesday could not say how many Afghans have been evacuated to the United States, adding that the situation remains “fluid” because of the swiftness of the operation.

Pressed to provide numbers, the official said the U.S. government was “moving as quickly as we can to get them out of harm’s way.”

“I don’t have exact numbers for you right now or a breakdown,” the official told reporters during a phone briefing. “Even if I did, it would shift as this process continues.”

President Joe Biden’s administration has scrambled to evacuate U.S. citizens and Afghan allies amid the chaos at Kabul airport ahead of an Aug. 31 deadline for U.S. forces to pull out of Afghanistan.

In the rush, the Biden administration has not said exactly how many Afghans have been allowed to enter the United States, a figure that could show the country’s commitment to resettling vulnerable Afghans but also potentially fuel concerns that Afghans could be entering the country without adequate security vetting.

Flights have arrived in the United States in recent days carrying U.S. citizens and Afghans.

After being tested for the coronavirus upon arrival, Americans can head to their homes, while others will go to a variety of U.S. military bases, where they will receive assistance in applying for work authorization, the senior official said on Tuesday.

The arriving Afghans will be connected with refugee resettlement organizations, said the official, who requested anonymity to discuss internal government operations.

Other Afghans evacuated by the United States have been sent to third-country transit points in Europe and Asia, the official said.

U.S. law enforcement and counterterrorism officials are carrying out “robust security processing” before those evacuees are allowed to enter the United States, including biometric and biographical checks, the official said.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal and Ted Hesson in Washington; Editing by Ross Colvin and Grant McCool)