Afghans awaiting resettlement in US forcibly deported back to Afghanistan from Pakistan: Report

After the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan in the year 2021, the United States completed one of the biggest airlifts in history, with more than 120,000 evacuations. The Afghans who were rescued to safety were promised a home in the US, but as per a new report, the country has taken days and months to process their applications, and the people have waited so long that they are now being sent back to the realm of the cruel rule that they fled.

As per a CNN report, dozens of Afghans, who were informed that they were eligible to apply for the resettlement process as they had worked with the United States, have been forcibly sent back to Afghanistan from Pakistan, where they had escaped awaiting the completion of the process that they were assured by the US.

A man, who was waiting for his US visa, spoke of his predicament as to how he was deported and released at the Afghan border by Pakistani police this summer.

“They did not hand us over to the (Taliban) Afghan border forces,” CNN quoted him as saying. “They just released us on the border and told us to go back to Afghanistan. It was me, my four kids and my wife deported together.” He is now living in hiding in the Afghan capital, Kabul.

Another anonymous Afghan, who also spoke from hiding, said, “So this is very, very dangerous, and it is very tough… How many people have been killed, had been tortured, have been disappeared?” The man, who is a former employee of a US contractor, said that the Taliban “will punish me, they will put me in jail. Maybe they will kill me? I’m sure they will.” He further added: “Still, we believe that the USA will help us. We believe we didn’t lose our hope still.”

After the Taliban's takeover on August 15, 2021, many Afghans were airlifted out of the country in a US-led operation. Thousands also fled across the border to the neighbouring country Pakistan, with often incomplete paperwork, after the United States issued guidelines that they should wait in a third country for their visa applications to be processed.

As per the State Department figures, approximately 90,000 Afghans have been resettled in the United States since then. However, many are on the backlog list of Afghan Priority 2 (P-2) or Special Immigrant Visas (SIV) applications that are waiting to be processed.

Afghans in Pakistan facing most acute situation

As per the human rights group, the ones in Pakistan are in the most critical situation as hundreds of Afghans have been deported from there in a crackdown against migrants after the recent political instability.

So far this year, at least 530 Afghans have been deported from Pakistan, CNN reported citing Haseeb Aafaq, a spokesman for volunteer group the Afghanistan Immigrants Refugees Council.

Aafaq said that the Pakistani authorities made no exceptions for pending US visa cases. “There is no differentiation. The authorities here do not even think about where you are from. If you are Afghan, you must be deported if your visa is not valid, whether you are SIV or P-2 or sponsorship cases,” CNN quoted him as saying.

(With inputs from agencies)

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